


Dark and Deep

by Shiny_n_new



Category: The Hobbit (2012), The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Dubious Consent, Dysfunctional Relationships, Humiliation, Intercrural Sex, Lima Syndrome, M/M, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Politics, Shaving, Stockholm Syndrome, Young!Thorin
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-01-27
Updated: 2015-11-28
Packaged: 2017-11-27 02:17:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 50,126
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/656974
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shiny_n_new/pseuds/Shiny_n_new
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Trapped in Mirkwood and unable to convince his grandfather to ransom him, Thorin finds himself at the mercy of King Thranduil. His captor is unpredictable and strange, and Thorin is very quickly in over his head.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [this Hobbit Kink Meme ](http://hobbit-kink.livejournal.com/2235.html?thread=3350203#t3350203) prompt. This story takes place five years after Smaug attacked Erebor.

The loss of Erebor had done little to sate King Thror’s greed. Indeed, to have possessed so much and to lose it all seemed to have driven the dwarven king to new heights of desperation, filling him with an insatiable hunger that could not be satisfied. It was the same desperation that would later drive him to attack Moira, the attack that would cost him his life, but that would not be for many more years.

In the meantime, the King in Exile had taken to sending his soldiers into battle against trolls and orcs, raiding the caches that the foul creatures left behind. It was not a terrible plan; it led to more gold for the newly impoverished dwarves, and it led to more hospitality from the towns of Men around them. Who would object to someone else fighting the trolls?

Thorin had been hopeful, at first. Perhaps they could regain some of their wealth this way. It would never compare to the gold within Erebor, but perhaps the treasures that the trolls and orcs hoarded combined with the work they got in the villages of Men would be enough to keep his people from begging in the streets or throwing themselves on the mercy of other dwarves. Like many of Thorin’s hopes for the future, it was a dream swiftly dashed.

The first sign of trouble came as he was examining the booty from one of the latest raids with his grandfather. Thorin picked through the jewels and swords with an expert eye, looking for any that had been rusted or deformed by the elements and could be reused. His frown grew deeper the longer he stared.

“My king,” Thorin said, then repeating himself to gain his grandfather’s attention. “These are all of Elvish make.”

Troll hoards were a mishmash of items, gathered from all corners of the world. It was not uncommon for them to contain the armor of men, the jewels of elves, and the crafts of dwarves in equal measure, heaped atop each other indiscriminately. The idea of a troll exclusively collecting Elvish items was outlandish. Thorin doubted that trolls had the brains to even understand that elves and men were not the same species.

King Thror raised an eyebrow. “If the residents of Mirkwood are foolish enough to leave their caches unguarded, then we’d be equally foolish not to take advantage of it.”

While Thorin would admit to feeling a great stab of pleasure at the thought of robbing Mirkwood’s elves, it was overshadowed by worry. Thorin might have hated the elves (oh, how he hated them, his mind making them as bright, terrible, and untouchable as the flames that had scorched Erebor), but he didn’t doubt their prowess in battle. A dwarf raiding party might be a match for an equally sized contingent of elves, but the battle would not be without casualties. They didn’t have the soldiers to spare to risk in skirmishes with the elves.

Thorin said as much to his grandfather, who quite obviously ignored his counsel. But Thorin was sure he was right, especially as he noticed the worried glances his father exchanged with Balin. A few weeks later, Thror directed more soldiers into raiding parties and leaving the caravans of Erebor with that much less protection. Thorin had to sit on his hands to keep from slamming them against the table.

He was barely an adult by dwarven standards, but even he could see that his grandfather was slipping in dangerous ways.

The winter months turned to spring, snow melting and leaving the roads muddy but clear. The refugees of Erebor traveled in caravans from place to place, split up to make less of a target to bandits and to make transit easier. To Thorin’s dismay, they were still travelling with too few soldiers, most of Erebor’s remaining army still occupied with the trolls. (In the coming decades, every dwarf of Erebor would be trained in combat. They would learn to wield a weapon as soon as they were strong enough to hold one. But before Smaug, Erebor had been a true kingdom, most of the populace made up of laborers and artisans rather than soldiers. Without the walls of the mountain, they were defenseless.) 

Thorin had not wanted to skirt the borders of Mirkwood. Indeed, when he had been put in charge of a caravan of his own, he had planned a route that would keep them safely away from the vast forest and its dangerous inhabitants. But nature seemed to work against him; the most passable roads were the ones that lay by the forest, with every other road slowly turning into a swamp under the wheels and boots of travelers. His caravan had several children and pregnant women in it, and he did not want to leave them exposed to the elements for any longer than he needed to. The future of Durin’s Folk already stood at a knife’s edge, and putting children in danger would not help at all.

For the first two days, the trip was uneventful. Thorin felt himself slowly relax as the third day dawned and their caravan began to wake. Perhaps this would be a peaceful trip after all.

That, of course, was when an arrow whizzed past his ear.

What followed was not so much a battle as it was dozens of half-awake dwarves screaming and running in circles while a company of elves thirty strong surrounded them. The elves appeared from the early morning mist as though they were a part of it, arrows drawn and eyes hard. If it pained them to see women and children cowering before them, there was nothing to give it away in their expressions.

“Drop your weapons,” Thorin ordered his men, because he knew the difference between bravery and suicide.

The elves herded them into small clusters, away from their wagons and any potential hidden weapons. One of them stepped forward towards Thorin, an arrow still notched in his bow. 

“You are Thorin,” the elf said, raising a dark eyebrow that contrasted sharply with the spill of pale blonde hair down his back. “Prince of Durin’s Folk.”

“You’re an observant one,” Thorin said, unable to keep the bite out of his words. “No wonder they put you in charge.”

The elf _laughed_ , which made Thorin’s hands curl into fists. “King Thranduil will be wanting a word with you, dwarf. Come along.”

Thorin flicked his eyes towards the small, huddled groups of his people. He would not leave them to the tender mercies of the elves.

The lead elf saw his reluctance. “If you’d like us to try and herd them all to the Elvenking’s palace, we can. But it is an unsettling journey for outsiders, and some of them will doubtlessly run off into the woods and be eaten by the spiders.”

Thorin sneered. “Take me to see your king, _elf_.” He spat the word like it was a curse. “The sooner I do, the sooner we can leave.”

He kept his head held high even as a dozen of the elves trained their arrows on him and led him into the darkness of the woods. He was the heir of Durin’s line and a survivor of Erebor. He would not be cowed by elves or dark woods.

If his hands shook and minute shivers ran down his back, well, no one needed to know that.  
***  
Thorin quickly decided that he didn’t like Mirkwood at all. Despite the bright sunshine, the forest floor was dim and treacherous, a tangled mass of leaves and tree roots. The sunlight that did make it down was green-tinged, giving the forest a strange, otherworldly feel. The longer the walk took, the worse it became, and if there was any kind of path they were following, Thorin could not perceive it. The elves seemed perfectly at home, stepping expertly across tree branches and huge patches of spider web, but Thorin’s nerves were raw and jangling by the time they finally stepped into a clearing.

He winced, his eyes having adjusted to the darkness of the woods. Before him lay the palace, built directly into a tall, rocky hillside. There had to be a system of caves beneath the hill that were a part of the palace, since the parts visible from the outside could not possibly be the entire building. Unless elves had a habit of living their entire lives on balconies, which he supposed was possible. Still, Thorin had to concede that it a marvel of architecture and of defense. Once the large stone and wooden doors were closed, Thranduil’s palace would become as impregnable as the hills and rocks it was built into. The hill was almost entirely green, dotted by planted trees and gardens. Bright blossoms of flowers ran in curving lines down the sides of it. It was beautiful, more beautiful than it had any right to be.

“Impressed, Master Dwarf?” the lead elf asked, raised an eyebrow and smiling slightly.

Thorin wasn’t sure if the elf was mocking him or not. He simply snorted and said, “So, the Elvenking lives in a cave. Very dwarf-like.”

The elf huffed and began walking, forcing Thorin to fall into step beside him if he didn’t want to be shoved forward by the other elves. “Our people live among the trees. The palace is for protection, not because we enjoy dwelling under a rock.”

Thorin resisted the urge to roll his eyes. Elves.

He did his best to keep his head high as he was led inside, marched through endless arches and green courtyards. The elves within the palace stared as he went past, eyes wide and some of them nearly gawking. Thorin wondered how long it had been since the elves of Mirkwood had received any visitors. He resisted the urge to lunge forward and shout at them. As funny as it would be to see the elves scatter like scared chickens, he doubted it would help his case.

Thranduil’s throne room lay high up within the hill, windows drilled through the rock letting in the sunlight and breeze. The throne was carved from wood, although Thorin was not quite sure that ‘carved’ was the right word. The wood seemed to have _grown_ into its current shape. It may even have still been alive. Thorin wondered whether that was Elvish magic or just very creative gardening.

He couldn’t afford to linger on the complexities of the throne, though. Sitting perched atop it was Thranduil, looking as haughty and flawless as a statue. Thorin knew that he would need to be focused and on his guard if he wanted to escape this situation without bringing great embarrassment to the line of Durin.

“Prince Thorin,” Thranduil said, tilting his head in greeting. “I understand you’ve seen fit to creep about my borders.”

“If I’d had my way, I would have been nowhere near your borders,” Thorin said, crossing his arms and doing his best to stand tall. Relatively tall, anyway. The elves had an unfair advantage in that respect. “But I cannot control the weather or the roads, and apparently neither can you.”

“The conditions of the roads outside my realm are not my concern-” Thranduil began.

Thorin cut him off. “Judging from my trip here, the roads inside your realm are not your concern either.”

Thranduil’s lips quirked into the faintest of smiles. “Time has not dulled your tongue, princeling. Perhaps you’ll be equally forthcoming about what you’re doing here with a substantial number of dwarves?”

“We are traveling to Briarton, to look for work among the men there,” Thorin said, seeing no reason to lie. He knew Briarton had some trade with Mirkwood, but if the Elvenking had enough sway to close the town’s borders to them, there were other towns nearby. “Do you stop all travelers and inconvenience them this way?”

“Not all travelers are members of a kingdom that has been robbing my people.”

Thorin nearly flinched. Damn. Their raids had not gone unnoticed after all.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Thorin said “If you’re being robbed, that’s not my business.”

“Your grandfather has grown careless,” Thranduil said, leaning forward with sharp eyes and tossing something at Thorin’s feet. “He should teach his thieves not to leave behind traces.”

Thorin stared at the small trinket at his feet. It was shiny and coated in spider web. His cheeks paled as he recognized it. It was a small clasp, meant for a cloak, stamped with the seal of Erebor. All of their soldiers had one. Thorin could easily imagine the dwarf who’d lost the clasp walking into one of the massive spider webs and becoming entangled, not even realizing that his clasp had come loose until he was out of the forest. Thorin’s mind raced as he sought an explanation.

“Our kingdom is scattered and not all of Durin’s Folk obey us,” Thorin said, doing his best to meet the Elvenking’s gaze evenly. “If a former soldier of ours has taken to robbery, than I apologize, but it is not our doing.”

“You lie as smoothly as a king,” Thranduil said, leaning his cheek against his hand. “But I have seen with my own eyes contingents of your soldiers searching for our hidden caches, too organized to be simple thieves. Before you choose to rob elves, perhaps remember that we can move unseen through the forest.”

Thorin did his best not to shift from foot to foot like a nervous child. He was out of lies, and falsehoods did not come easily to him, no matter what the Elvenking might think. The truth, then. Surely Thranduil wouldn’t keep an entire caravan of dwarves captive?

“My grandfather’s orders are not my concern unless they’re addressed to me,” Thorin said, nodding stiffly. “My caravan is composed of travelers, nothing more.”

“I don’t believe you,” Thranduil said, smiling slightly as though Thorin had said something mildly entertaining.

“Ask your own soldiers!” Thorin said, gesturing at the elves that flanked him with frustration. “They’ve seen the caravan, they know it’s unfit for either battle or robbery. Unless it’s common policy for elves to bring children and pregnant women to war.”

Thranduil’s eyes flicked to the lead elf. “Legolas?”

“He speaks the truth,” the elf, Legolas, said with a nod. “They were ill-prepared for any kind of battle, and their wagons are already filled to the brim with their things. If it is a raid they had planned, it is a very inexpert one.”

“And I do nothing inexpertly,” Thorin sneered. “So kindly guide me out of this forest and let us go on our way.”

Thranduil considered him for a long moment, his face giving nothing away. Thorin had to fight not to lower his eyes; Thranduil’s gaze was pure power and intimidation. But Thorin was prince of Erebor, even if he was also currently a penniless exile. 

“I wonder,” Thranduil said, as if just musing aloud, “how much of my peoples’ wealth your grandfather would be willing to return in exchange for you? Ransom is after all the way that bandits conduct business, and I’d hate for your people to feel out of their element.”

“We are not bandits!” Thorin snarled, stepping towards the throne with his fists raised. He heard the creak of leather and bowstrings and stopped in his tracks, lowering his hands with some difficulty.

“A matter of semantics and opinion, I suppose,” Thranduil said. He leaned forward again and his voice went low and kind. “Tell me where you were to meet with your grandfather, Prince Thorin, and I will send a messenger to him with haste.”

Thorin kept his jaw tightly clenched, looking away from Thranduil.

“I have no desire to send an army and spark a war,” Thranduil said gently, as if he was speaking to a child. His lips quirked, something that was not quite a smirk. “I just want what belongs to me.”

“My caravan?” Thorin asked, because he could recognize a hopeless situation for what it was. Was he going to somehow fight his way out of Thranduil’s palace, navigate the labyrinthine forest, and return to his people before the elves that had lived their entire lives in Mirkwood reached the defenseless dwarves?

“I will let them go free,” Thranduil said, and Thorin whipped his head around in surprise. “You have my word as king. You are far more valuable than them.”

Thorin snarled, but he knew that Thranduil was correct. His fingernails dug into his hands until he drew blood as he told Thranduil the coordinates to the rendezvous point. His grandfather would be very unhappy to part with some of his hard-won gold, and Thorin could already imagine the screaming fit that he would have to endure. Fury burned in his chest, hotter than usual.

“Your stay here will be far more comfortable if you cooperate,” Thranduil said, leaning back against his throne calmly. “I will send a messenger, and you will be given a room to stay in while we await your king’s reply.”

Thorin expected ‘room’ to actually mean ‘cell’, but to his surprise, he was led to small quarters a few hallways from the throne room. He figured it must have been a resting room for the guards that were off duty; it was small and windowless, but otherwise clean and comfortable. Being locked in and able to hear the guards on the other side of the door made it significantly less comfortable, but beggars couldn’t be choosers.

The bed was probably a bit narrow to the elves, but would fit Thorin comfortably. He sat upon it wearily, dropping his head down to cradle it in his hands. Hopefully, this humiliation would be over soon.  
***  
Thranduil had not lied about the swiftness of his messengers. Thror’s response came by noon the next day, in an envelope bearing the waxen seal of his grandfather’s crest. The runes of his writing were familiar, so familiar that Thorin would know them anywhere. He knew the message was not a trick, but came from his grandfather’s own hand.

‘Handle it yourself. I cannot clean up your messes, and we cannot afford to pay a ransom.’

It was a small, terrible pleasure to incinerate the parchment over the flame of a candle, burning it away until it was nothing but ashes.


	2. Chapter 2

Thorin took his time preparing to meet Thranduil. He bathed until the water was past tepid and into cold, scouring the road-dirt from his skin and washing damn near every strand of his hair. He braided his hair and beard afterwards, fingers quick and nimble when it came to that familiar activity. His clothing had been washed and he dressed in front of a mirror, ensuring that every buckle and fur was in place.

If he had to throw himself on an elf’s mercy, he would do it while looking every inch like a prince of Erebor.

When he finally felt calm, Thorin knocked on the door and informed the guards that he needed to speak to the Elvenking immediately. To his relief, they actually took him. He hadn’t been sure that elves would listen to his wishes, even if he was prince of a foreign nation. The walk gave him time to further settle his nerves, and even allowed him to feel a bit of optimism. Perhaps he’d be let go? What was Thranduil going to do with a dwarf he couldn’t ransom? The elves were not…well, the elves _were_ cruel, but in an aloof way, cold and distant as the moon. He would not be tortured or killed, and if he had no worth than Thranduil would have no use for him. Perhaps that had been his grandfather’s plan all along? (Some part of Thorin knew that such thoughts were nothing but rationalization after the fact, but he chose to ignore them.)

He was led out to a veranda, the stone beneath his boots warm from the midday sun. Vines bearing small, blue blossoms curled themselves around the railing and supports. Thranduil sat at a small wooden table, and his hair caught the sunlight in a way that was almost blinding. Across from him sat the lead guard from yesterday, the one Thranduil had called Legolas.

Thorin raised an eyebrow. Guards, even treasured guards, were not so familiar with their kings. So perhaps Legolas was a relative or a lover? Thorin did his best to discretely examine the elf as he was brought closer. He decided on relative. Legolas had the same dark brows and jawline as Thranduil, looking more like the Elvenking than the guards that were escorting Thorin.

“Ah, Thorin,” Thranduil said. “Your grandfather has responded, I understand?”

Thorin wondered if Thranduil had read his grandfather’s response. The language of runes was not supposed to be known to anyone outside the dwarves, but the trickery of elves could not be underestimated. “Yes.”

He waited for Thranduil to ask what the response had been, but Thranduil merely stared at him, an edge of amusement in his eyes.

Jaw stiff, Thorin said, “I would prefer to have this discussion without an audience.”

Thranduil tilted his head in acquiescence and said something in Elvish to the guards behind Thorin. They closed the doors to the veranda as they left, leaving Thorin alone with the two elves. He glared pointedly at Legolas.

“He counts as an audience.”

“The Prince of Mirkwood has a right to sit in on his father’s affairs,” Legolas said, and in that moment he was nearly identical to Thranduil, wearing his father’s smirk.

Thorin was not going to beg some elf brat to leave just to spare himself humiliation. It was going to be humiliating either way. His fingernails bit into his palms as he said, “My king will not ransom me. We lack the funds.”

The two elves stared at him in silence for a long moment, their expressions inscrutable. Thorin glared back at them. He refused to be shamed into cringing and lowering his eyes. He dared them to jeer at him.

Thranduil turned away first, saying something to Legolas. The words were quick and musical, and Thorin couldn’t understand a single syllable of it. Blasted elf language. Legolas nodded and rose from his seat. As he passed by Thorin, his hand twitched as though he was going to reach out towards him. Thorin bared his teeth, and the elf apparently thought better of it, skirting around him instead. As he reached the door, Legolas turned and said something else to his father, gesturing to Thorin with a troubled expression. Thranduil simply repeated what was probably a dismissal of some kind, and then Thorin was alone with the Elvenking.

“It seems that we must negotiate,” Thranduil said, gesturing to the chair that Legolas had just left. 

Thorin was certainly not going to leap up into a chair that would leave his feet dangling in the air like a child. Nor was he going to stand by the table; it came all the way up to his chin. Instead, he moved past the table and leaned against the balcony railing, putting the sun at his back and crossing his arms. 

“I have nothing to negotiate with.” There was something almost freeing in saying it, making a mockery of the Elvenking’s plans. “I suppose you could take what we had in our caravan, if you have some use for dwarven furniture and knitting. My sword is finely made, assuming your guards didn’t destroy it when they took it from me. Perhaps you could use it as a butter knife.”

Thranduil’s lips tilted up again into that strange half-smile. “You show remarkable arrogance for someone who has nothing to bargain with.” 

Thorin spread his arms. “You won’t kill me, elf. Your reputation precedes you. And I suppose you could lock me up for a hundred years and let me waste away in your dungeon, eating your food and harassing your guards, but I suspect we would both lose patience with that.” He shrugged, a smirk stealing across his face. “I have nothing to offer you.”

There was a flash of something old and terribly dangerous in Thranduil’s expression. He rose from his chair. “Nothing but yourself.”

Thorin went still, because surely he had misheard or misunderstood? It certainly _sounded_ like a proposition of some kind, the sort Thorin had received a few times before in the villages of men. But it could not be, because Thranduil was an elf. Elves were repulsed by everything that was not them. He was mistaken, surely. 

“What?” Thorin asked inelegantly. 

“You are not unattractive, for a dwarf,” Thranduil said, and he laughed at Thorin’s noise of fury. “And it is the traditional method of bartering, when all other paths are closed.”

“Maybe for elves!” Thorin snapped, pressing his shoulders back against the stone railing. “Not for dwarves! What you pointy-eared monstrosities get up to in your forests is of no interest to me! The answer is no, you filth!”

“I do not need your permission, princeling,” Thranduil said, looming over Thorin. “You are my prisoner, and your kingdom doesn’t wish to reclaim you.” Thorin couldn’t hide the wince that caused him. “So I offer you this, as a way to repay what your people owe me.”

He moved before his mind had quite caught up to the rest of his body. Thorin heaved himself onto the balcony railing, balancing precariously for a moment. He jerked backwards when Thranduil took a step forward. His heels hung off the edge. He could survive a roll down the hillside; dwarves were made of stern stuff. Voice unsteady, Thorin said, “I will find my way out of the woods myself, and there’s nothing you can do to stop me.”

He could not read Thranduil’s expression, had no idea what to make of the small shift in his jaw or the tightening around his eyes. He did not know if it was anger or amusement or something else entirely. What he did know was that Thranduil’s voice was cold and light as he said, “Go ahead.”

Thorin did not move. He felt like a rabbit in a snare, all sides of a traps closing in around him.

“Should you find your way out without being recaptured or killed--unlikely, by the way--it will be to find that your caravan and your people at Briarton will have been overtaken by my soldiers.” Thranduil said all of this with damnable calm, watching Thorin with bright, eerie eyes.

Thorin felt himself wobble, and knew it had nothing to do with his balance. “I thought you did not want a war?”

“I do not,” Thranduil said, with a small movement of his shoulders that was probably a shrug. “But I have learned that I cannot keep my borders closed and my people safe if I allow transgressions into my kingdom. Even by a relatively,” and the sneer was obvious, “ _harmless_ group. I will get my recompense one way or another, Thorin. The only question that remains is whether it will be at your expense.”

Put like that, Thorin knew his choice was as inevitable as the sunrise. Even if he found his way out of the woods, how could he explain to his father or his siblings that he’d chosen to send an army towards them rather than let some elf paw at him? And what would his grandfather say? Thorin twitched just thinking about it. 

Still perched on the balcony railing, he asked, “So…so you’ll lay with me and then release me?”

“I will keep you for a month,” Thranduil said. He glanced upwards. “Full moons are good for repaying debts and granting mercy. As luck would have it, tonight is a full moon. You’ll begin the repayment of your debt, and at its next appearance, you will be granted mercy.”

A _month_ in this terrible place? Thorin shuddered, opened his mouth to argue, and then closed it again. If he argued, would Thranduil make him spend even longer inside of Mirkwood? The pointy-eared whoreson already knew that Thorin was going to agree. There was nothing to stop him from adding on days simply out of spite.

“A month, starting today, and not another day longer,” Thorin said, lifting his chin and glaring at Thranduil.

“Agreed,” the Elvenking said, wearing a small smile. “Now get off of the railing. You’re crushing the vines.”


	3. Chapter 3

The rest of the day passed intolerably quickly. Thorin was returned to his room and ordered to stay there until Thranduil summoned him for dinner. Thorin assumed the Elvenking was busy with the affairs of his kingdom, though he had no idea what those affairs might be. Herding spiders, being smug, and indulging in perversion, probably.

Thorin wrote letters to his grandfather and father, reassuring them that he had the Elvenking’s word that he would be released upon the next full moon. He did not include the details of the arrangement, both from desire not to spark a war and from a deep sense of shame. He also wrote letters to his siblings; Frerin and Dis were still too young to be consulted in the affairs of the kingdom, and he did not want them to worry for him. Writing took up the better part of the afternoon, and by the time Thorin gave the letters to the guards to be sent out, he felt less like clawing his way out of the stone walls.

Still, he flinched when the knock on his door came. He crossed his arms to his shaking hands, and followed the elven attendant who had summoned him.

He had imagined being brought into a banquet hall of some sort, perhaps to be paraded about and humiliated further. But he instead guided towards a small room that contained only a table and a fireplace. The room was no less elegant for its size, however. It was probably for less formal affairs, ones that didn’t require an entire court to be present for the meal. He tried to remember the name for such a room and failed. Had it been so long since he’d had a palace of his own?

Thorin’s eyes were immediately drawn to the huge windows that dominated most of the wall, giving an unimpeded view of the sun setting on the forest. The first stars were already visible. Since Thranduil was not even there yet, Thorin wandered over to the windows and touched the glass gently. It had been some time since he’d seen such exquisitely clear glass. Not since Erebor.

“Ideal for letting in the starlight,” came Thranduil’s voice from behind him. Thorin turned as the Elvenking entered the room, as graceful and ethereal as ever.

Thorin sneered. “Erebor is finer.”

“Erebor has a dragon in residence,” Thranduil said, sweeping past Thorin to sit at the table.

Thorin snarled at him, but had to admit that he’d rather walked into that particular remark. It did not decrease the venom in his voice as he snapped, “No thanks to you and your army, Elvenking.”

“Ah,” Thranduil said, steepling his fingers and staring down at Thorin. “And what good would it have done to lead my soldiers to their death, little dwarf? What would we have been to Smaug besides biting gnats to be burnt alive as we tried to enter the mountain?”

“You could have tried!” Thorin stepped towards Thranduil with his fists raised, as if to batter some remorse into the elf. 

“As I am sure your people would have done were the situations reversed,” Thranduil said, raising an eyebrow. 

“Dwarves are not cowards,” Thorin said, and he spat on the fine stone floor. “We do not flee like children.”

Something cold and angry flashed across Thranduil’s face before it was hidden behind a stoic mask, and somehow that was more unsettling than if Thranduil had shouted at him. For the first time since Thranduil had entered the room, Thorin remembered the terms of his bargain. He swallowed and lowered his fists, but did not lower his gaze. If Thranduil wanted to punish him, let him.

Instead, Thranduil simply said, “Sit. Unless you’d prefer to eat your food off the floor like an animal.”

Thorin didn’t deign to respond to that and climbed into the chair across from Thranduil instead. At some unseen signal, attendants suddenly entered the room bearing plates. Thorin looked at the food curiously, since he was actually quite hungry. It was all greens and fruit, which was disappointing but unsurprising. He had heard the elves had a thoroughly boring diet. Still, he dug into the food, pleased that Thranduil wasn’t attempting to make conversation. It was better not to have to pretend this was anything besides…

Fear clenched Thorin’s stomach tightly and he pushed his plate away, the sight of food making him slightly nauseous.

“Are you well?” Thranduil asked.

“Not hungry,” Thorin grunted, avoiding Thranduil’s eyes. He swallowed several times until his stomach stopped rolling. Even as the nausea faded, his fear remained, ratcheting ever higher. “And stop pretending that you have any concern for me or my eating habits.”

“I am not in the habit of starving guests,” Thranduil said mildly.

“What about prisoners?” Thorin snapped. He drained the last sips of wine from his glass and let it thunk against the table. It did not calm him down. It only made things worse. He knew the signs that his body was slipping into complete panic. “You will not lull me into some false sense of safety.”

Thranduil raised an eyebrow. “And what do you imagine I’d gain from tricking you? You are already here, and you have already given your word.”

“I don’t presume to know your mind, elf,” Thorin said, digging his fingernails into the table.

Thranduil put his silverware aside and stared intently at Thorin. “You make things so needlessly difficult.”

“I’m sorry,” Thorin spat through gritted teeth. He pushed himself away from the table. “Did you want me to lie beneath you and murmur sweet nothings while you _fuck me_?”

His breathing came fast, his heart pounding in his chest like a thrashing bird. He knew that terror had to be written across his face and he hated himself for it. Thranduil stood. In retrospect, Thorin would realize that it was likely a gesture of concern, no matter how perfunctory. But all he could see in his panic was the elf reaching for him. Everything else forgotten, Thorin turned on his heel and ran.

He made it past the door and down the hall before the guards caught up to him. Their hands on his arms only startled him further, and he whirled around and drove the dinner fork that he was still absurdly clutching straight into a pale elvish hand. But it was far from any kind of actual strategy, and Thorin found himself pinned in short order. Forced to his knees, Thorin realized that the elf he’d stabbed was none other than the Prince of Mirkwood.

Fantastic. Mahal was truly smiling down on him lately. 

Legolas stared down at his hand in distaste, flicking away the drops of blood that were welling from three small holes. Kneeling, he told Thorin, “You need to stop struggling, dwarf.”

Thorin just stared at him, hands clenching and unclenching compulsively. Legolas sighed and rose to his feet. “Take him back to my lord.”

The elves’ fingers were tight around his arms as they walked, digging in hard enough to bruise. Thorin had a brief flash of anger while he wondered why that was necessary. It wasn’t as though he was struggling.

But he _was_ struggling, he realized dimly. His arms and legs lashed out at his captors, without any input from his brain at all. He was operating on instinct and pure panic, and everything in him wanted to run. He’d never run from a battle in all his life, but this…this was different. This was no battle, and even if it had been, he had already lost.

The Elvenking was still seated, looking as serene as a winter morning. He took a sip from his wine glass, hands elegant and pale. “You ran.” His eyes flicked to Legolas’ bleeding hand and grew stony. “And you have injured my son.”

“Ada, I am fine,” Legolas said, but the hard look did not fade from Thranduil’s eyes.

Thorin still struggled in his captors’ grips, unable to stop himself. He wanted to cry out that he’d changed his mind, that he couldn’t do this, but fear for his people stifled his voice. Caught between two terrible extremes, he could do little more than struggle ineffectually and stare wide-eyed at Thranduil.

“I am unsurprised,” Thranduil said, folding his hands atop the table. “Like all wild things, you struggle when the time comes for you to be tamed and lash out like a child.”

“Go and fuck yourself on your elk’s antlers, you pointy-eared son of a whore,” Thorin spat, the words forcing themselves past his gritted teeth. 

The guards holding him went still, and Legolas gave him an alarmed look. Thranduil tilted his head, slowly and very deliberately. No one addressed the Elvenking with such disrespect, evidently. Thorin smiled (though it was more of a snarl) and spat at his feet for emphasis.

Thranduil gestured and said something in Elvish, and Thorin was released and tossed at the king’s feet. He scuttled backwards without any conscious thought, uncomfortable with being on his knees in front of Thranduil. He pulled himself to his feet at the end of the table, hand gripping his chair until his knuckles went white.

The door opened behind them and a servant walked in, carrying another glass of wine which was set at Thorin’s seat. His eyes flicked towards the open door, then back to the Elvenking, still as motionless as a statue.

“I would not advise it,” was all Thranduil said.

The guards closed the door as they left, trapping Thorin in the room with Thranduil. Thorin clenched his fists to hide the way his hands shook and said, “Your son fights like a clumsy maiden.”

Thranduil actually _smiled_ , though there was nothing kind about it. “Finish your meal and have your drink, princeling. You’ll need it for tonight.”

Teeth gritted, hands shaking with fury and fear, Thorin climbed back into his chair. It put him closer to eye level with Thranduil, at least. He grabbed his new glass of wine and took a long swig, hoping it would steady his nerves. The wine was good, heady and rich, and he drained the glass dry. If he had to endure this, and it was becoming increasingly clear that he would, being a bit drunk would surely make it more bearable.

“Eat,” Thranduil commanded, as if nothing at all had happened. His fingers picked delicately through the berries on his plate.

Thorin stabbed a fork viciously into the leaves on his plate, twisting until they were nothing but pulp. Long minutes passed, the only sound the crackle of fire, the small clinks of cutlery, and the sound of Thorin very deliberately blunting Thranduil’s silverware. Finally, Thorin dragged his fork across the plate, which produced a very satisfying screech, and tossed it on the floor.

“Enough of this farce!” Thorin said, slamming his hands down and leaning forward. Or that was what he’d meant to do, anyway. His hands hit too close to the edge of the table and he nearly tumbled from his chair. He looked down curiously, wondering how he’d misjudged the distance. Was…was the room spinning a bit?

“Are you quite all right?” Thranduil asked, and there was just enough smugness in his tone to alert Thorin to how dishonest a question it was.

He looked up sharply, and the movement made him so dizzy that he nearly tumbled over. “What…have you done something to me?”

“There is a powder we make from the fangs of the spiders,” Thranduil said, examining a berry he had speared on his knife. “It is not lethal, but causes dizziness, weakness, and eventually total paralysis. Victims lose consciousness in time, but apparently the spiders quite prefer their prey to be aware when they begin to eat them. The powder is tasteless and can be dissolved in food or drink without anyone being the wiser.” Thranduil smiled at him, showing a hint of teeth. “I’ve never beheld its effects on the Naugrim before, but I’d imagine you’re feeling strange right now.”

Thorin tried to leap from his chair, but he landed badly and nearly broke his own ankle. By the time he’d untangled his limbs, Thranduil was upon him. The elf seized him by the shoulders and laughed, “Where would you go, little dwarf?”

Thorin tried to claw at him, but his movements were slowing and his coordination was utterly ruined. Thranduil _twirled_ him, still laughing, and the motion made Thorin so dizzy that he had to lie on the ground afterwards, holding on for dear life. By the time the room had stopped spinning, several servants had come and gone before leaving the king with his prisoner again.

Wobbling, Thorin grabbed the edge of the table and pulled himself up to look. There was a knife, which sent a cold frission of fear down his spine, and…a bowl with some kind of foam in it? Soap, perhaps?

He stared at the bowl, not understanding what was happening. Did Thranduil mean to wash him? He tried to push himself backwards, but his movements were slow and uncoordinated, and Thranduil had looped a small length of rope around his wrists before Thorin even realized the Elvenking had moved. It left his hands bound in front of him, further hobbling him. His fingers wouldn’t respond to his commands.

“Just in case,” Thranduil said. “I would hate to underestimate you and see you injure yourself.”

“Or injure you,” Thorin slurred.

Thranduil simply smirked and knelt down next to him. Before Thorin could protest, Thranduil had pulled him forward onto his lap, turning him so that Thorin’s back was to the Elvenking’s chest. Thorin’s faced flushed with blood from some combination of fury and humiliation. How dare Thranduil manhandle him like he was a child? And the Elvenking’s _lap_ was the last place that he wanted to be. Thorin squirmed, trying to lunge forward and out of Thranduil’s grasp. 

“Let me go!”

Thranduil reached out of Thorin’s line of sight, and when his hand came back, he was holding a knife. Before Thorin could react further, Thranduil pressed the blade against his throat.

Thorin went still instantly. Surely Thranduil didn’t mean to kill him after all? Or was he going to be tortured? How much torture could the Elvenking possibly accomplish with Thorin sitting on his lap? His limbs felt weak, and Thorin wasn’t sure if it was from the fear or the drugs.

“Why so quiet now, little one?” Thranduil asked. His free hand reached across Thorin’s chest to toy with one of the small braids dangling from his beard. “Does your courage fail you?”

Thorin leaned his head back instinctively, trying to put more distance between his throat and the knife. It left him resting his head on Thranduil’s shoulder, the line of his throat even more exposed. “If you kill me, my father will not care if our king gives him permission to seek his revenge. You may not fear me, but you should fear him.”

“I don’t mean to kill you, princeling,” Thranduil said, his lips against Thorin’s ear. “Just teach you a small lesson in humility.”

The blade flashed, flicking forward and slicing easily through the braid Thranduil held. Thorin gaped, furious as he comprehended what Thranduil meant to do. He was going to shave off his beard.

Thorin _screamed_ , thrashing and kicking with renewed vigor. He didn’t care if the knife cut his skin, so long as it stayed away from his beard. There was no greater mark of dishonor for dwarves than to be shaved entirely; it was something only slaves and outcasts were expected to endure. He wondered if Thranduil even understood the terrible significance of what he was trying to do. As the Elvenking’s hand closed around his throat, Thorin thought, _Yes, he knows exactly what he’s doing._

“Shhh,” Thranduil murmured, holding Thorin still as he thrashed. “Shhh. You cannot fight this. There is no shame in surrender.”

Thorin’s limbs grew heavy even as he struggled, his pounding heart spreading the poison through his body faster. His body still shook, though, even as he found himself lying limp across Thranduil’s lap.

 _Do not cry_ , he told himself sternly as Thranduil cut off the other braid. _You are not a child. You are a prince, an heir of Durin. Do not cry._

And so Thorin did not weep as Thranduil spread foam across his beard with a small brush. His cheeks remained dry even as Thranduil dragged the knife up them. Thranduil’s hands were steady and his knife was razor sharp; in a painfully short span of time, Thorin felt the cool air on his bare chin for the first time in a decade.

“There,” Thranduil said, and Thorin forced his eyes open to look up at the elf. Thranduil was staring down at him curiously. “So this is what you look like without that beard.”

Did Thranduil mean to take him now, like this? Thorin let out a low, keening sound.

“Thorin?”

“Haven’t…’th anyone…n’t since Er’bor,” Thorin slurred out. He hated how small and frightened his voice sounded, and wasn’t sure if his loathing burned brighter for Thranduil or himself. “Please…not like this.”

Was it his imagination, or was there a flash of something very close to pity on Thranduil’s face? It had to be, surely. Thranduil ran his hand along Thorin’s face, closing his eyelids with surprising gentleness. Thorin lacked the strength to raise them again.

“Sleep, Prince Thorin. None will disturb you.”

He felt himself being lifted, and then sleep overtook him.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So since Thranduil has a fabulous elk antler throne in the sneak peek for Desolation of Smaug, this obviously means that the throne I thought up for him isn't canon. The hazards of writing before the next installment comes out. If you want to pretend like the elk throne hadn't been built or is in the shop for repairs during this story, feel free ;-)

Thorin came back to consciousness slowly. He was lying on an unfairly comfortable bed and the morning sun was shining down on him. It had been a long time since he had been able to give into such luxuries, and he was loathe to force himself into wakefulness. He could not remember what had led to him sleeping in on this wonderful bed, but he planned to enjoy it while it lasted. The pillow beneath him was exquisitely soft and he rubbed his face against it sleepily. 

Something seemed subtly wrong, however, and it twitched at the back of Thorin’s mind. He grunted and buried his face deeper into the pillow. The feeling that something was not quite right didn’t abate, but he could not place what it was. Finally, he opened his eyes and blinked in confusion at the unfamiliar sights.

He did not recognize this room and did not remember how he’d come to be in it. It took a moment of wracking his brain to recall that he was a prisoner in Mirkwood, but this was not the small, windowless room that he’d woken in yesterday. This room was wide and airy, with windows stretching across an entire wall. The view of Mirkwood was deceptively beautiful, the forest looking green and peaceful from a high vantage point. Thorin stepped cautiously out of the vast bed (and really, it was obscenely large, who needed a bed that huge?), his feet sinking into the thick, soft rugs that lay across the stone floor. He looked down, wondering when he’d taken his boots off.

There was a large silver pitcher resting on a low table nearby, and Thorin took an unsteady step towards it. Hopefully, it would be full of water. It wasn’t until he caught his reflection in the polished silver that Thorin’s memories of the night before came rushing back.

He let out a furious cry and reeled back from the pitcher, but he could not escape his reflection. A mirror of fine silvered glass hung on the wall and he could see himself in it, beardless as the day he’d been born. The unfamiliar line of his jaw made him flinch, and his bare cheeks made him snarl at his reflection. He raised a hand and felt his chin, like an amputee feeling for a limb that wasn’t there. His throat seemed horribly exposed; no arrow or warg could possibly miss such a stark, white target. 

A door opened behind him and he whirled to see Thranduil entering the room. He tilted his head when he saw Thorin, like a curious bird, and said, “Good morning.”

Thorin launched himself at Thranduil with a howl of rage, his fist slamming against the Elvenking’s chin. His punches were wild and unfocused, more like an animal lashing out than any strategic attack. His fury blinded him to anything but the need to make Thranduil regret ever even thinking of taking a blade to Thorin’s beard.

For a few brief moments, Thorin had the element of surprise on his side and the Elvenking was caught beneath the barrage of his punches. But Thranduil was much older than Thorin and had survived more fights than Thorin had even conceived of. Thorin felt a hand on his shoulder and a knee against his hip, and then he was being flipped. Quite suddenly, the ground was at his back and Thranduil was atop him. Thorin was a strong young dwarf, but his strength would not be enough to overcome the Elvenking’s experience and wiliness. In short order, he found himself pinned, his arms stretched above his head and Thranduil’s weight pressing down against his body.

It was not a position he wanted to be in, all things considered. 

“You’re certainly more alert,” Thranduil said dryly, pushing his knee down that much harder when Thorin began squirming. There was a smear of blood across his lip where Thorin’s fist had broken the skin. “Lie _still_.”

“You bastard, you orc-fucking, you-” Thorin’s fury was such that he couldn’t quite complete an entire insult, but Thranduil had doubtlessly picked up on his meaning. “I’ll kill you, I’ll strangle you with your own womanish hair, I’ll-”

“You will be silent,” Thranduil said, “or I’ll drag you out before my court barefaced and make you walk laps around the palace.”

That froze Thorin in place, the blood rushing to his face at the sheer thought of that kind of humiliation. He’d rather Thranduil’s filthy wood-elves see him naked than beardless. At least naked, he had nothing to be ashamed of. He swallowed several times, willing himself into some kind of calm, and gave a short, sharp nod. 

“If I let go of you, are you going to continue your tantrum?” Thranduil asked, with a glint in his eyes that Thorin couldn’t interpret.

“No,” Thorin gritted out, tensing his arms.

Thranduil released Thorin’s wrists and stepped off of him gracefully, going to sit at the edge of the bed. Thorin climbed to his feet and dusted himself off. His cheeks burned with blood, the knowledge that someone was _looking_ at him in his beardless state making him profoundly uncomfortable. His humiliation only grew worse as Thranduil reached out tilted his chin up so that Thorin was forced to look at him.

“Being barefaced suits you surprisingly well,” Thranduil said, with a small smirk.

Thorin jerked his chin out of Thranduil’s hand and stepped away. “Do not touch me.”

“Bitterness, on the other hand, does not suit you at all.”

“Then perhaps you should not have defiled me,” Thorin snapped. He felt terribly anxious; he reached up to the silver pitcher and poured a glass of water mostly to give himself an excuse to move.

“This was a lesson,” Thranduil said, watching him intently. ‘You can continue to attempt escape and you will cause yourself pain. Or you can accept your situation and leave relatively unscathed in a month’s time.” 

“I will cause myself pain, you say,” Thorin snorted, twisting the glass of water between his hands. “Like I’m an animal with its leg caught. _You_ will cause me pain, you mean.”

Thranduil nodded slowly. “Fair enough. It is all semantics regardless.”

Thorin turned away from him to stare out the windows. His shoulders drawn up, he asked, “So. What now?”

Thranduil rose from the bed. “Now, there is breakfast.”

Breakfast was an exquisitely awkward affair, at least for Thorin. They dined in the same room that they’d eaten in the night before, and Thorin’s eyes kept drifting to the spot on the floor where Thranduil had held him down and shaved him. Every time a server came in bearing a tray of fruit or porridge, Thorin ducked his head and couldn’t make eye contact. It was terrible, being seen like this. His cheeks burned with humiliation.

Thorin picked at his food with little interest. He glanced over to find Thranduil watching him intently and snarled before looking down at his plate. He refused to look back up, but he could still feel the elf’s eyes on him. 

“Tell me, prince, is this the worst thing that could have been done to your person?” Thranduil asked, leaning forward with an eyebrow raised.

“Yes!” Thorin snapped, stabbing his fork into an entirely innocent bit of melon on his plate.

“Then calm down,” Thranduil said, rising from his seat and smiling. “What else have you to worry about, now that the worst has happened?”

Thorin gaped at him, caught between fury and bewilderment. Did Thranduil honestly believe that he had done some kind of backhanded favor for Thorin, or was he simply being sarcastic? Before he could gather his wits, Thranduil was already striding towards the door.

“I have my duties to attend to. You’re free to wander until you reach a locked door. Trying to pick the locks would not be in your best interest, unless you’d care to find out how baldness suits you.”

And with that, Thranduil was gone, sweeping gracefully through the doors like a gust of wind. Thorin slowly lowered his head to the table and stayed like that for a long, long time.

Eventually, even wallowing in despair grew boring, and Thorin set about exploring the limits of his cage. The first door he tried was the one he knew led out to the rest of the palace. He wasn’t surprised to find it locked. Thorin considered his options. He could pick the lock, but to what purpose? There were doubtlessly guards on the other side, and even if he managed to slip past them, he would still have to navigate the rest of the palace without being seen.

 _And what then?_ he asked himself. There was still the dark and terrible forest outside. There were still the elvish guards that patrolled it. There was still the threat of Mirkwood’s army hanging over his family’s heads.

Thorin let his hand slide of the doorknob and sighed. No, there would be no escaping. At least he wouldn’t have to face his family while beardless.

With his dreams of escape thoroughly thwarted by reality, Thorin went back to exploring. He supposed he was in Thranduil’s private wing of the palace, since he saw no one else and the rooms were lavishly furnished. Thorin ran his fingers along a silk tapestry with a tired huff of breath. He missed Erebor. Mahal’s hammer, how he missed Erebor.

It was nothing so crass as just pining for their wealth, although Thorin was honest enough to admit that was a factor. He missed wearing nice clothes and eating fine food, and he was reasonably sure that did not make him an immoral or greedy dwarf. But beyond the material things, he missed his _home._ He missed the security and the safety that Erebor’s walls brought, and he missed living in the mountain that his family and his people had carved and made their own. Erebor was not simply a mountain; it belonged to the line of Durin and they belonged to it, and Thorin had not understood how keenly he loved it until it was taken from him.

One day, they would find a way back. Thorin was sure of it. His father and grandfather loved Erebor and their people just as much as Thorin did, and they would find a way to give Durin’s Folk a home once more. In the meantime, Thorin would snoop through the Elvenking’s things.

Most of the rooms Thorin explored contained nothing much of interest. There were several sitting rooms, looking out over different parts of the forest. There was a small, private library, but the books were in Elvish and the doors were locked. Down a set of stairs, there was a private bath with tile mosaics of fish and other sea creatures sweeping across the floor and walls. On the outer edge of the perimeter was a room with a glass ceiling. Thorin wasn’t sure of its purpose until he saw several telescope stands and recalled that the elves were said to be very fond of stars.

A few rooms were locked, and Thorin made a mental note to investigate them further at a later date. He was going to be here for a month, after all. There was no need to risk infuriating Thranduil again so soon.

Thorin grunted in surprise when he opened the door to the next room and found it filled with various musical instruments. It had the look of a storage room, with a thin coating of dust on some of the tables, but the instruments seemed to be in excellent condition. Thorin plucked at the strings on one of the fiddles and ventured deeper into the room.

He saw flutes, lyres, drums, and a few instruments he’d never encountered before. Thorin wondered if they all belonged to Thranduil or if they had simply been stored here for expediency. He scanned the room, not quite admitting to himself what he was looking for, and his heart leapt a little when he saw a tall, cloth-draped shape in a corner.

Sure enough, it was a harp. Thorin smiled and twanged one of the strings gently. It hadn’t been played in some time, but it seemed to be in tune. It was a bit too big for him, since the elves made their instruments as disproportionally large as they were. But it was still a harp. His own in Erebor had been better and better cared for, but…

Thorin glanced at the door. Thranduil had told him to amuse himself.

He pulled the harp out of the corner and started to play. It was the first time he’d smiled since he’d come to Mirkwood.


	5. Chapter 5

Being a prisoner was _boring._ None of the old war stories his father and grandfather had told ever mentioned that. It was made worse by the fact that Thorin wasn’t used to having time to idle. Every day since Erebor had been a frantic rush of trying to get things done. If he wasn’t working, than he was searching for more work. If he wasn’t actively shepherding his people, than it was because he was helping his relatives shepherd them. Having nothing at all to do was a bit disconcerting, and rapidly becoming very dull.

He played the harp. He tossed rocks off the balcony into the forest below. He perused the library until he found books he could read. He found echoing spaces and made odd noises just for the fun of it. He avoided mirrors. He napped. And at the end of the day, just after the sun set, Thranduil came to find him. They had dinner, and Thorin was sent back to the little, windowless room. In the morning, he was escorted back to Thranduil’s wing of the palace for breakfast and then left on his own again. Thorin saw no one besides Thranduil and the occasional servant bustling through the corridors.

By the fourth day, he was ready to pull his hair out from boredom. It wasn’t that he particularly wanted to spend time with Thranduil, but he would accept nearly anything to break up the monotony. He had a feeling that he was being toyed with, that his intense boredom was part of some kind of point Thranduil was trying to make, but frankly he didn’t care. There were only so many times he could read the history of the Silmarils. Anyway, he was sure the Arkenstone was better and brighter than any of those elvish rocks.

Thorin wasn’t a mischievous dwarf by nature, but he was still young enough that boredom and impulsivity could combine in spectacularly dangerous ways. The rooms behind the locked doors were the only ones that he hadn’t explored, and they’d grown increasingly fascinating the longer he was left to idle. At half past noon, he finally gave in and went looking for any small pins he could use as lockpicks. He discovered a few that he thought would work in the library, where they were being used as bookmarks. Perfect. 

Thorin chose a door at random, one that was made from heavy oak with a tree carved into the front of it. The lock was tricky, partially because Thorin was not actually very good at picking locks. But he had nothing but time and boredom, and after ten minutes of tinkering, the door swung open. Thorin picked up the candle he’d brought and slipped inside, closing the door behind him to keep any errant servant from noticing that it had been opened. 

The candle turned out to be unneeded. After a trip down a short corridor, no more than 30 feet, Thorin found himself standing in bright sunlight. He blinked and blew out the candle, staring up at the high glass ceilings above him. Around him, plants grew in unbroken rows of green, interspersed with bright riots of flowers and the occasional muted earthentone of a pot. So this was some private greenhouse, one that Thorin had been banned from on some whim of Thranduil’s. How boring.

Still, he’d gone through the effort of breaking in and he still had several hours to kill. He might as well explore.

The old stories, told by the greybeards in Erebor, held that Mahal had made the dwarves in secret. Not because they were shameful, of course, but because forging a masterpiece required concentration and would not brook interruption. But because they were created by Mahal’s hand alone, his wife Yavanna of the trees and growing things had given the dwarves no bond to plants, cutting them off in a way the men and elves were not. Thorin was not sure if it was true or not; who could say what had happened thousands of years ago? But it was true that dwarves in general had very little interest in botany. They had farms of course, but not much beyond that. Perhaps that was because Yavanna was distant from them, or perhaps it was simply because dwarves were a practical people. Regardless, there had been no greenhouses like this in Erebor, simply for personal enjoyment.

Thorin wandered through the rows of plants, stopping occasionally at some that were particularly bright or fragrant. He recognized some of the plants, mostly those used in cooking or medicine. Others were entirely foreign to him. He leaned close to one patch of flowers in particular, fascinated by their golden color. They looked as if they’d been forged rather than grown. He reached out towards one, stroking his fingers along the side, almost not believing that it was a delicate petal beneath his fingers instead of metal.

“Goldleaves, we call them,” came Thranduil’s voice from behind him.

Thorin let out a decidedly undignified yelp and tripped over his own feet trying to get away. He scuttled backwards until he ran into a pot, staring wide-eyed at Thranduil. The Elvenking gazed down at him with half a smile on his face, something that didn’t reassure Thorin at all.

“H-how…” Thorin had been so sure that Thranduil would never even know that he’d glanced at these rooms. How could he have found out so quickly? 

“It is not simply locks that guard my doors, son of Thrain,” Thranduil said, tilting one of the goldleaves up with a finger. “The magic that runs through these halls may not be as strong as that which guards other realms, but it serves its purpose. Such as alerting me when dwarves are sneaking about in rooms they should not be in.”

“I did not-” On second thought, he was not sure how he planned to end that sentence. Did not what? Break in? He clearly had. Did not think he would be caught? Obviously. He could not read Thranduil’s mood, and the Elvenking had proven too mercurial already. Thorin remembered the threat to shave his head as well as his beard, and he trembled. “I’m sorry.”

“How dwarf-like, to find the loveliest object and begin pawing at it,” Thranduil said, turning his gaze fully on Thorin. There was no mistaking the anger in his voice. 

“I’m sorry,” Thorin repeated, climbing to his feet. “I had run out of things to do and I didn’t-” Thorin’s anger flared at the fact that he was _apologizing_ to this wretched elf. “And even caged birds get mirrors to peck at! I’m not some object you can put away in your rooms until you find a new way of tormenting me.”

“I’m sorry,” Thranduil said, voice low and silky. The threat in it was unmistakable, and Thorin pressed himself back against the plants. “Have I not spent enough time ensuring your good behavior? I can see to that immediately.”

Thorin did not want to know what punishment Thranduil would seize upon, and he certainly did not want it inflicted on him. The Elvenking’s anger was a dangerous thing and Thorin needed it gone. His mind scrambled, desperate for some solution that wasn’t running or fighting, neither of which would get him far. Thranduil stepped forward, putting the buckle of his belt at roughly eye-level for Thorin, and a terrible idea occurred to him. Terrible, and perhaps successful. ‘You are not unattractive, for a dwarf,’ Thranduil had said.

Would it be so wrong to bargain for leniency this way? Had he not already agreed to it?

“Wait, wait, there’s no need for…just wait,” Thorin said, voice desperate and pleading even as he wondered if he could really go through with this. He reached out towards Thranduil’s belt, fingers settling on the buckle, body moving before his mind could stop it. He could do this, he could surely do this, he had done this with other dwarves and enjoyed it. If he closed his eyes, he could pretend he was back home. “We can settle this another way.”

He moved to unlatch the buckle, and Thranduil’s hands shot out to grab his wrists. Thorin hissed in pain. The elf’s grip was as tight as any iron band.

“What are you doing?” Thranduil asked, and Thorin found that he couldn’t raise his eyes to meet the Elvenking’s. Thranduil sounded more puzzled than angry, at least. Thorin could feel a blush burning on his cheeks and he missed his beard fiercely.

“I…you’re holding me here to bed me,” Thorin said, trying to put some kind of strength behind his words. He was no mewling prisoner, content to cower beneath his jailer, even if he felt very much like mewling right then. “To pay off the debt that you think my people owe you. Well, I would much rather pay off whatever punishment you think I’m owed that way, instead of letting you humiliate me.”

Thranduil said nothing, and Thorin dared not look up to see his face. Instead, he yanked against Thranduil’s grip, surprised when he was released. He stepped back enough to give himself room to breathe.

“I do not know,” Thranduil said, voice lilting, “whether you are very smart or very stupid, princeling.”

Thorin’s eyes shot up at that. Thranduil’s expression was curious, like Thorin was some fascinating animal that he hadn’t seen before. The anger was gone, which was reassuring, but Thorin did not feel any more in control of the situation than he had when Thranduil seemed to be on the verge of beating him. 

“I’d like to think I’m very smart,” Thorin snapped, rubbing his wrists nervously.

Thranduil moved suddenly, crossing the distance between them with only one long step. Thorin found his chin seized and his head tilted up. Then Thranduil’s lips were upon his and Thorin was caught beneath the onslaught.

His mouth fell open in shock and Thranduil took full advantage of it, his tongue pushing past Thorin’s lips. Thorin could hear his heart pounding in his ears and feel it in his lips. He felt as if Thranduil was surrounding him entirely, nothing but smooth skin, soft hair, heat, and deceptive strength. Thorin felt dizzy, like his legs could not hold him and he could not tell up from down. If Thranduil’s had not had an iron grip on the back of his neck then he would have fallen.

It was the most forceful kiss that Thorin had ever received in his life, and he surprised himself by moaning into it.

That seemed to break whatever spell the Elvenking was under, and he released Thorin as suddenly as he’d grabbed him. Thorin gasped for breath (he had not even noticed the lack of air) and staggered. He heard the sound of a door slamming, and looked up to find the Elvenking gone.

“ _What?_ ” Thorin asked aloud, wondering if he was going mad. The greenhouse had no answer for him.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, so I am deeply sorry for the lack of updates to this fic. My college classes kicked into high gear these past few months, and the flashdrive that I was writing on was stolen in the uni library. (Someone, somewhere, has the unfinished, unedited version of this chapter and a lot of Thor/Loki porn. Sorry, random thief.) But this new chapter is finally here, just in time for the _Desolation of Smaug_! 
> 
> Also, I've started a writing Tumblr here, as a way to motivate myself: http://shinynewwriting.tumblr.com/  
> I'd love it if you followed!

By the time Thorin had the presence of mind to chase after Thranduil, the Elvenking was nowhere to be found. He wandered the halls in frustrated confusion, finally settling back in the library for lack of anything else to do.

Was Thranduil mad? That _would_ be Thorin’s luck, being held prisoner by a lunatic elf. Or perhaps it was just normal for elves to fluctuate wildly between passion and calm, between hot and cold. Thorin had never spent enough time around elves to know their moods and habits, and he had never wanted to.

He leaned his head against the cool stone wall and sighed deeply. He didn’t know the Elvenking’s mind, and he doubted he ever would. But at the very least, Thranduil wasn’t punishing him. If there was one bright spot, that had to be it.

Thorin stayed in the library for the rest of the day, until he heard the sounds of servants in the halls. That always signaled the start of dinner, and he was curious to see if Thranduil would actually be there. Perhaps he could find some answers, at least.

He crept along the halls, instinct keeping him quiet and sneaky even when there was no reason for it. When he finally came to the main hallway, it took a few moments of bracing himself before he could actually step out of the shadows. He could hear Thranduil’s voice coming from the dining room, though, and that drove him on.

The servants paid him no mind as he paused at the door. A dwarf without a beard probably wasn’t such an oddity for creatures that were normally barefaced. If he had been surrounded by dwarves, they would either be staring in disdain or averting their eyes entirely. Thorin wondered how the elves would react to the loss of something defining but non-lethal, like their pointy ears.

 _Mahal’s forge and all his crafts, stop stalling and get in there already_ , Thorin told himself. Pondering the habits of elves wasn’t going to accomplish anything. He stepped into the dining room. 

Thranduil glanced at him, but otherwise did not acknowledge him at all. He was talking to a servant in that lilting elf language that Thorin was no closer to understanding. He was beginning to pick out some words, however. He knew the words for ‘bread’ and ‘king’. And ‘dwarves’, but he’d known that already. ‘Naugrim,’ which apparently translated literally to ‘the stunted people.’ Fucking elves.

Thorin waited until the servants had cleared the room before he said, “Well?”

Thranduil raised an eyebrow, every inch the unruffled king. In a tone that indicated he had no idea what Thorin was talking about, he repeated, “Well?”

Fine. If that was the way the elf wanted it to be, than _fine._ Thorin snarled and bit the entire head off the roasted fish sitting in front of him.

They ate in silence after that, although Thranduil spent most of his time watching Thorin. Thorin, in response, ate the majority of the food on the table and glared at everything in the room that was not Thranduil. He couldn’t seem to meet the Elvenking’s eyes.

After Thorin had run out of fruit to demolish, Thranduil finally spoke. “You are angry.”

Thorin finally managed to glare directly at him. “I often am.”

Thranduil looked _amused_ , damn him, as if he hadn’t kissed Thorin and then run away not five hours ago. “What is the specific target of your ire tonight, dwarf?”

If Thorin glared any harder at Thranduil, the Elvenking might well have caught fire. Which would solve only about a third of his problems. “Use your oversized elven head and have a guess.”

Thranduil raised an elegant eyebrow. “Did you want to repay me with your mouth after all?”

“What I _want_ is to know where I stand with you!” Thorin slammed his fists against the table to punctuate his words. “You say you’re going to bed me, and then you do not. You act as though you’re going to utterly subjugate me, and then you flee this afternoon. I am a prisoner here, and my continued survival depends on getting some measure of you, but I never can. I never know what is going on, and it’s terrifying.”

That had been much more than Thorin wanted to reveal, he realized in the silence following his words. But there was great relief in finally saying it aloud, like he’d finally shoved a heavy load off his back. He curled his fists in the tablecloth, belatedly hoping Thranduil’s mood wasn’t about to take a turn for the worse.

But Thranduil was actually smiling, albeit a small and sly smile that wasn’t overly reassuring. “Come here.”

“No,” Thorin said, gripping the tablecloth a little tighter.

“Allow me to make it an order.”

Thorin moved as slowly and grudgingly as possible, but he was crossing a fairly small space. He stood before Thranduil, shifting from foot to foot for a moment before he groused, “What do you want, then?”

Thranduil moved suddenly, grabbing Thorin under the arms and laying him across the table. Thorin just barely avoided hitting his head on a bowl of fruit. He kicked at Thranduil, aiming for his ribs, but the elf quickly pinned him beneath his greater weight.

“Release me!” Thorin demanded, clawing at Thranduil’s arms.

“No, I don’t think I will,” Thranduil said. He used one hand to pin Thorin’s wrists above his head, and Thorin cursed the elves for having so much strength hidden away in their willowy bodies. Thranduil rested his other hand on Thorin’s chest and began sliding it downwards.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Thorin hissed.

“Putting you at ease,” Thranduil said. He began to tug at the laces of Thorin’s trousers to loosen them.

“You’re doing a terrible job.” Thorin had to go silent then, swallowing convulsively as Thranduil’s fingers brushed across the bare skin of his stomach for the first time.

“You’ve worked yourself into a frenzy fearing that I’ll touch you,” Thranduil said. He leaned over Thorin, his hair falling like a curtain around them both. “There’s no need to fear.”

His movements were graceful and unstoppable, like waves crashing into the shore. He pulled Thorin’s trousers down lower, until they tangled around the middle of his thighs. Thranduil looked down at him, bared, his face full of some emotion that Thorin would never be able to interpret. Thorin went still, like a rabbit caught in a hawk’s gaze. 

Then Thranduil closed his mouth around Thorin’s cock, and the world lost all sense as Thorin bucked upward like he’d been struck by lightning.

Thorin had not been aroused and he was still afraid, but Thranduil’s mouth was stunningly hot and Thorin was, after all, a young dwarf. He hardened so quickly that it was nearly embarrassing. What was embarrassing was the way he groaned, his head thunking back against the table as Thranduil’s tongue wrapped warm and wet around the base of his shaft.

Thorin’s fingers twitched convulsively as his hips bucked up. He was unsure if he was trying to escape or not. Thranduil hummed around him, the sound low and impossibly musical, and Thorin nearly sobbed.

Oh, the Elvenking was _good_ at this, forcing Thorin into a rhythm despite all of his struggles. He did not gag, did not choke, did not even seem to be breathing any differently. Thorin wanted to say something cutting about Elvish promiscuity, but he knew the sting would be lost while he was writhing on the table like a tavern wench.

His toes curled tightly in his boots, sensation shooting down his legs and up his spine as Thranduil cupped his stones in one surprisingly warm hand. Thorin bit down hard on his lips to keep from speaking. He would not plead with this elf, either to stop or to give him more. 

(He was fairly certain, though, that if he were to open his mouth, the only word that would emerge was _“What?”_ , repeated over and over.)

Thranduil was not holding him down anymore, Thorin realized. One hand was wrapped around the curve of Thorin’s hip and the other was splayed across his chest, fingers tangled in his hair. Thorin could have punched, or clawed at Thranduil’s eyes, or smashed a bowl across his head.

Instead, he curled his fingers in the hopelessly rumpled tablecloth and watched through half-lidded eyes as Thranduil slid pale pink lips across the head of his cock.

It was not destined to last long. Thorin was young and it had been at least two years since he’d bedded anyone. It had been two years since anyone had touched him, really. When his orgasm came, it came fast and almost unexpectedly, the rush of sensation overtaking him too quickly for him to do anything but stutter a warning.

For a brief, blissful moment, everything faded away. All of his fear, all of his worry, all of his responsibility. For a moment, it was just him and a feeling of peace and wellbeing. It could not last forever, but he held onto it for as long as he could.

Thorin came back to himself slowly. The first thing he noticed was that his hands were clenched tight in Thranduil’s hair. It was like holding a handful of impossibly fine, smooth chains, the strands cool and unbreakable beneath his fingers. Thranduil was propped above him, hands on either side of Thorin’s waist. The Elvenking stared down at him, an expression of smug satisfaction on his face. His cheeks were not flushed, his clothes were not rumpled, and there was no evidence of what had just happened on his lips.

Thorin let go of Thranduil’s hair abruptly. His trousers were still tangled around his thighs, and he felt his face coloring as he reached down to tug them up. To Thranduil, he muttered, “Stop crowding me.”

Thranduil obligingly stood, but didn’t take his weight off Thorin’s legs. Thorin could sit up, but not much else. After a few seconds of fumbling to get his clothes in order, Thorin gathered his courage and looked up at Thranduil.

“Why?” he asked, and didn’t feel he needed to elaborate.

“I want my revenge,” Thranduil said, seemingly out of nowhere, and Thorin felt himself flinch before he could control it. Was this the moment Thranduil turned to violence? But Thranduil simply continued staring down at him. “Against your people and against your family. But I am not a monster, son of Thrain. You won’t be ravaged and left for dead.” 

With that, he turned abruptly and glided from the room without another word. Apparently, he felt the evening was done. Thorin just stared after him, boggling. 

The Elvenking had an unusual way of reassuring someone.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy New Years, everyone!

Naturally, things went badly soon after that. Nothing in Thorin’s life could be easy for long.

The fifth day of Thorin’s captivity dawned bright and calm, with his guards summoning him from his small, windowless room for breakfast with Thranduil. Thorin tried not to blush as his eyes were inevitably drawn to the spot on the table where Thranduil had pinned him and swallowed him down. He was sure something in his expression must have showed his discomfort, because one of the guards gave him an odd look before leaving them alone. Thranduil was smirking, and that just made Thorin blush harder.

Damned elves.

Thorin refused to speak, grunting in response to Thranduil’s greeting. He spent most of breakfast staring down into his tea and thanking any power that was listening that Thranduil was not the type to make small talk. However, his steady eye contact with the tea meant that he was taken completely by surprise when Thranduil reached out to cup Thorin’s jaw.

“How long until your beard begins to grown in?” Thranduil asked, running long fingers along the smooth, sensitive underside of Thorin’s chin.

Thorin shivered and it took him a moment to gather his wits enough to answer, “Two or three days, I expect.”

Thorin’s hair had always grown fast for a dwarf, so that at least would work to his advantage when the month was over. He’d heard men could regrow hair overnight, that they could shave in the morning and wake up the next day covered in stubble. Odd creatures, men.

“Perhaps I won’t keep you barefaced, if you’re agreeable,” Thranduil said, tapping Thorin’s cheek gently.

“I’m always agreeable,” Thorin responded, feeling brave enough to offer Thranduil a cheeky smile.

Thranduil smiled back, and opened his mouth to speak. Before he could get a word out, however, the doors to the dining room burst open.

“My king!” the elf said, giving Thranduil a quick bow. “Orcs have been sighted by the eastern falls, an entire raiding party. The Guard Captain asks for your counsel, if you can spare it.”

“Of course.” Thranduil rose smoothly from his seat, ordering Thorin to “occupy yourself” without bothering to look back at him.

Thorin sighed, unsure if it was in relief or disappointment, and set to work finishing his porridge.

He wandered out of the dining room and considered a trip to the music room, as he’d begun calling the dusty room where the harp was stored. He’d already half-turned before he saw it out of the corner of his eye.

The door to the rest of the palace was open.

It was just a small crack, like someone had left hastily and forgotten to close the door behind them completely. A gust of wind might be enough to close it entirely. Thorin stood frozen, staring at it like it was some snarling beast that had materialized in front of him.

 _Run_ , was his first, instinctual thought. To run and run and not stop until he was free of the forest and its master both. He had never promised that he wouldn’t try to escape, had he? And his caravan was long gone, safely gathered with the rest of the dwarves. For once, there was only himself to think of. This might well be his best opportunity.

Or it might be a trap. Perhaps Thranduil was testing him? The Elvenking seemed at least slightly mad most of the time, and Thorin would not put it past him to set up a test that he knew Thorin was doomed to fail.

Should he run? Should he stay? Thorin rocked back and forth on his heels, not looking away from the door.

What would his father or grandfather say if they knew Thorin had been presented with a perfect chance to run and had chosen to stay a captive instead?

Thorin swallowed, closed his eyes, and took a deep breath to brace himself. Then he threw the door open and bolted down the hall.

The shouting and commotion was immediate, but Thorin was prepared for it this time. He had a plan and was not fleeing in a blind panic. The elves were bigger than him, but he was still a bit more agile and harder to catch. As he raced down the stone halls, he waited until one guard was nearly upon him before dodging quickly to the side. The guard recovered quickly, skidding to a stop, but it was enough time for Thorin to launch a spinning kick at his kneecap. The guard hissed out what was presumably a curse and tumbled over, giving Thorin a prime opportunity to leap over him and continue running.

Thorin had the advantage of surprise. As he darted past dozens of elves going about their business, most of them only realized several seconds after the fact that they should probably be chasing him. While he certainly did not know the layout of the entire palace, he wasn’t a fool; just like in Erebor, the paths that led upward would be the paths that led out.

He was very nearly captured rounding a staircase. A guard on the flight below him reached up and grabbed him by the ankle, sending Thorin tumbling forward. He only barely avoided cracking his skull open on the stone steps. Twisting, Thorin lunged forward and bit the hand that was holding him until he tasted blood. It wasn’t the most elegant solution, but Thorin was not in an elegant mood.

The guard released him with a cry of pain, and Thorin tasted elf blood in his mouth. It was almost sugary, like sweetmeats. He licked his lips and whirled around to drive his feet into the midsection of the elf that was closing in on him. She tumbled back down the stairs with a cry of surprise. Thorin was off and running again within seconds.

Thorin remembered the entrance to the palace, a massive pair of doors leading out into the world. That was the only exit that he was sure of. If word had reached the guards and the doors were closed, Thorin would be out of luck. Given his run of luck so far, he was honestly expecting it.

But for once, fortune favored him. He saw a flash of morning sunlight and smelled fresh, cool air, and it gave him the burst of speed that he desperately needed. Thorin was through the doors and running towards the forest before the guards even realized that an escape was happening. The sound of shouting echoed after him.

Thorin let out a wild laugh as he entered the trees. He had done it, he had truly done it! He’d outsmarted the wood elves in their own home and escaped from their grasp. This would be a story he could brag about for _decades._

Of course, he needed to actually get out of the forest first. Hopefully, the elves would be distracted by the orc raiding party, giving Thorin the time he needed to find his bearings. Mirkwood was labyrinthine, yes, but surely he could find his way. He had plenty of daylight. All he needed to do was head west and that would eventually take him out of the forest and rid him of the elves. The tree cover was still thin enough that he could see the sun, and Thorin nodded and fixed its location in his mind. With a plan firmly in mind and hope in heart, he stepped off the path and into the underbrush.

It took two hours before Thorin could finally admit to himself that he was hopelessly lost.

Mirkwood was not a normal forest. There was something _wrong_ with it. He had not noticed it before, when the elves had been leading him; he’d simply thought Mirkwood to be a dense, dark wood full of spiders and underbrush. But now that he was alone (and lost, there was no ignoring that), Thorin could see the forest for what it was. There was magic woven through it and in it, a dark and dangerous kind of enchantment.

The air was thick, as if he was breathing in smoke that pooled in his lungs no matter how he coughed. He heard scuttling noises constantly, but they stopped the moment he whirled around to locate the source. Twenty minutes ago, he had stumbled across a wide, flat rock with an elk head sitting in the center, laid out like an offering. It looked freshly killed, untouched by insects or rot, but there was no blood anywhere and Thorin had been unable to find its body. Maggots were speared, still wriggling, on the points of each antler.

Thorin had left it where it lay. All the gold in Erebor wouldn’t have convinced him to touch it.

In retrospect, it might have been a hallucination, because Thorin was fairly sure he was beginning to hallucinate. His vision kept flickering, and he could see things moving out of the corner of his eye. They were large and shadowy and clicked at him. He hoped he was hallucinating.

A splashing sound startled him, and he looked down to find himself ankle-deep in a small stream. He’d walked right into it without even noticing. With a sigh, Thorin crossed to the other bank and then knelt down to have a drink. The water was cool on his parched throat, and he splashed his face several times, hoping the cold would shake him back to his senses.

Still kneeling on the bank, he looked around at the forest and tried to gather his bearings. It was no use. The trees were all massive and ancient, and they all looked the same. Thanks to the thick cover of the leaves, he couldn’t even see the sun. The occasional beams of light filtering through the foliage were the only reassurance he had that there was something to the world besides this forest, no matter how unending it seemed.

Another hour passed. Thorin laid propped against a tree, trying to get a grip on his vertigo. It ought to have been impossible to have vertigo while he was on the ground, but apparently anything was possible in Mirkwood. He closed his eyes and considered his options. He did not want to be in the forest when night fell. Things could only get worse once the sun was down. If he could not find his way out (and by now it was quite clear that he couldn’t), Thorin knew he was going to need to return to the elves, no matter how much he didn’t want to. Of course, he had no idea how to get back to the palace, either.

There was a rustling noise in the brush. Thorin opened his eyes, wondering if he was about to be eaten by an enormous spider. It took him nearly a full minute to realize that he needed to act, that he needed a weapon of some sort. Thorin groped around until he found a rock of a decent size and then staggered to his feet. His fighting stance was all wrong since his balance was utterly ruined, but he would work with what he had.

An orc stumbled out of the bushes, blinking owlishly at Thorin. 

Thorin blinked just as owlishly back. In all the chaos of escaping, he’d utterly forgotten that there were orcs in the forest. This one appeared just as lost as Thorin was, and in about as foul a mood. It bared its teeth and stepped towards him.

“I’m not real,” Thorin said, hefting the rock. “I’m a hallucination.”

It was worth a try, and the orc seemed to consider it for a moment. But then it took another step towards Thorin, growling out something in its ugly language, and Thorin resigned himself to probably being gutted and devoured. He wouldn’t go down without a fight, though, and he hoped to orc choked on him.

Thorin would never quite understand how he won that fight or even survived it. Most of his trip through the forest would eventually just be a confusing, unsettling blur in his mind. Ultimately, though, he would piece together a few fragments.

He was smaller than the orc, and that made him a harder target to grab.

The orc was armed and he was not, but disorientation made the sword swings go wide and wobbly. Thorin remembered attacking the orc’s sword arm, their struggle sending the blade twirling off into the bushes.

He remembered thick, strong fingers around his throat.

He remembered bringing the rock up.

He remembered blood, thick and black and smelling like rot. It hit his face like filthy raindrops.

He remembered the orc’s fingers going slack around his throat and his weight falling fully on Thorin. He remembered squirming out from under the orc as it wheezed out a death-rattle, the stone Thorin had used as a bludgeon still embedded in the side of its head.

Then Thorin had been alone with the forest once more.

The adrenaline of the fight gave him some clarity, enough to force him to his feet to search the orc’s body. He needed weapons. Or food. Anything, really, would be to his advantage, because he had nothing at all.

Thorin discovered a small pouch containing flint, and it took him several moments of staring before his mind could force together some kind of plan. Fire. He needed the elves to find him. He could make a fire.

When he had been a child, little more than a babe peering around his parents’ knees, his mother had told him what to do if he was ever lost in the woods outside of Erebor. 

_“Stay where you are, little darling,_ ” she’d said, smiling as Thorin played with the rubies strung through the braids in her beard. _“Stay where you are and call out for help. If you are far away from any who would hear you, you can start a fire to create smoke, but only-_ ” and she had grasped Thorin’s tiny hands for emphasis, “only _if you can control it, all right, dear heart?”_

His mother lay dead in Erebor’s halls, the mountain that had housed her serving as her tomb. Her advice and her songs and her laughter lived only in Thorin’s memories, now.

 _And it will all be for naught unless you pull yourself together and light a fire so the accursed elves can find you!_ Thorin told himself, trying to force his mind out of the morass of grief and confusion that it wanted to sink into. Fire, he needed fire.

He found his target in a bush a little ways off from the other underbrush. The fallen leaves and dead twigs below it would make decent kindling. He was reasonably sure lighting it ablaze wouldn’t take the entire forest up with it, but if it did…well, maybe it had always been his destiny to die by fire.

This forest and its madness was making him morbid.

Thorin’s hands shook as he tried to spark the flint, and it took eight tries before he finally succeeded. The spark leapt from his hand and began happily consuming the leaves, sending a thin, white trail of smoke towards the forest canopy. It would get bigger, and the elves would see it, and Thorin would be free of this forest. He had to believe that.

The roots of a tree were a surprisingly comfortable resting place, considering how inhospitable the rest of the forest was, and Thorin curled himself up like a cat as he watched the fire begin to consume the bush. Watching the flames gave him someplace to focus his eyes, to keep them from chasing after the imagined wraiths and shadows that kept flickering in the corners of his vision. 

His sense of time seemed to…slip, for lack of a better word, like a pocket watch with rusted gears. One moment, the fire was a tiny thing, little more than smoke and noise, and the next minute it had devoured most of the bush. A large plume of smoke trailed into the sky. Thorin looked up at it, envying the way it slipped through the forest canopy. When he turned his attention back to the fire, it was to discover Legolas standing beside it.

Thorin jerked back against the tree, startled. Hesitantly, he asked, “You’re real, aren’t you?”

“Oh, I’m real,” Legolas said, and though he still had the uncanny stillness of an elf, Thorin could see the anger radiating off of him. “Have you been enjoying the hospitality of our forest, dwarf?”

Thorin just grunted and wobbled to his feet.

More elves slipped from the trees like wisps of smoke. Several of them were carrying buckets and began pouring water on the bush to douse the flames. The fire crackled and hissed as it drowned.

“Were you trying to signal someone?” Legolas asked. He moved with the same sudden, frightening swiftness of his father, and Thorin’s hands were bound tightly in front of him before he understood what had happened.

“I was trying to signal _you_ , you pointy-eared twit,” Thorin sighed, too relieved at the prospect of not dying in the forest to put much bite in the words. “Who else would be wandering around out here?”

“A party of orcs, twenty strong,” Legolas said, his eyes cold and very blue.

“Nineteen strong,” Thorin said. “One stumbled across me, and I bashed its head in with a rock.”

Legolas tilted his head like a curious bird. “Where?”

Thorin jerked his chin in the direction that the body laid, wondering why Legolas cared. The elf called an order over his shoulder and did not take his eyes away from Thorin. After only a few minutes, the scout Legolas had sent returned and nodded. Legolas released a breath Thorin hadn’t realized he was holding.

“Back to the palace with you, dwarf. My father is in quite a state. I don’t imagine you’re in for a pleasant night.”

His temper sparked, and he wanted to whirl around and drive his fists into the elf’s gut. But Thorin was tired, the strange malaise of the forest still weighing him down, and so he just grunted again and fell into step in front of Legolas. The elves moved as nimbly through the forest as ever, and it made Thorin feel like a clumsy ox in comparison. Especially since his coordination was not improving as time went on. If anything, it was getting worse.

Finally, he tumbled over a tree root and was only saved from falling flat on his face by Legolas’ grip on the back of his coat.

“Hmm,” he heard Legolas murmur as he lowered Thorin to the ground. Thorin tilted his head up to see Legolas staring at him quizzically. “Have you eaten anything you found in the woods?”

Thorin shook his head.

“Drank the water, then?”

“Just a small bit,” Thorin said, already wincing. Was the water going to cause boils to erupt all over his skin, or make him vomit his own intestines out?

Legolas sighed, as if everything about this day had been an irritation specifically meant for him. It was strange, how the elves spent much of their time looking unearthly and unreal, only to reveal their deeper emotions in brief moments. For just an instant, Legolas looked as irritable as any dwarf. “That will be one more calamity for my lord to sort out.”

Thorin found himself being picked up and he struggled instinctively. Thrice-damned elves, thinking they could just heft a person into the air because they were taller-

“Would you _stop_ , you wretched thing?” Legolas hissed. “You cannot walk without staggering and I am in no mood to coax you through the woods. Either lie still like a sack of grain until we reach the palace, or I will drag you behind me through the dirt. It is entirely your decision.”

Thorin glared at him. Apparently, being ill-tempered and arrogant was a trait that could be passed from father to son. Still, Thorin was in no mood to be dragged, and so he reluctantly forced himself into stillness.

Legolas did indeed carry him like a sack of grain, slung over his shoulder with no thought given to his comfort. Thorin lacked the energy to be truly angry, though. He was tired and very lost, and at least this way he would not stumble and hurt himself. The elf’s shoulder was bony, but Thorin managed to wriggle until he was decently comfortable. It was possible that he fell asleep for a few minutes during the trip, though it was hard to tell given his disorientation.

There was a flash of bright sunlight, and then thick shadow. Thorin looked up to see the gates of the palace. He sighed with relief.

“If you are so delighted to see the palace again, why did you leave?” Legolas asked, making no move to put him down as they passed through the gates. Thorin watched the doors slam closed behind them. The soldiers guarding it were not subtle as they glared at him.

“I am a prisoner,” Thorin said, because was it not completely obvious?

“You are a guest more than anything else,” Legolas said. “Prisoners are kept in the dungeons, shut away. I wouldn’t be surprised if you’re thrown down there after this, though.”

They both fell silent after that. The elves that had been escorting them broke away from the group until it was only Thorin and Legolas. Thorin felt Legolas nod to the guards and another set of doors slammed behind them. Legolas put Thorin down at the foot of Thranduil’s throne, and it forced Thorin to look up (and up and up) to see the Elvenking. What he saw did not make him feel optimistic. Thranduil sat upon his throne like a statue, motionless and cold as stone. His expression was distinctly unwelcoming.

“Well, well,” the Elvenking said, rising from his throne, “look who has returned to my halls.”

Thorin squirmed under Thranduil’s gaze, especially when Thranduil came closer and loomed over him. As addled as he was, standing up straight was a challenge; he wasn’t up to presenting an unbowed and unbroken front.

Nearly a full minute of agonizing silence passed before Thorin realized that Thranduil was waiting for him to speak. He could not quite meet the Elvenking’s eye as he said, “I had to try.”

The backhand caught him completely by surprise and it sent Thorin flying. His head slammed against the foot of the throne and he lay there like a stunned bird, unable to fully understand what had just happened. Thranduil was screaming at him, but it took a moment for his mind to register the words.

“-ally yourself with orcs and lead them into _my kingdom,_ something I thought even your race was above! I should send you back to your grandfather in _pieces_ -”

“Orcs?” Thorin murmured. His lip was bleeding where Thranduil’s rings had caught the skin, he realized distantly.

Legolas started speaking then, fast and urgent. He was not quite stepping between his father and Thorin, but he had stepped forward. Thorin felt grudgingly grateful, because he could barely summon the coordination to sit up at the moment. Thranduil hid a frightening amount of strength in his long, thin limbs.

Thranduil turned to face his son, and he seemed to be asking a question. Thorin would have traded his beard for the ability to understand Elvish. He pushed himself up, leaning against the foot of the throne woozily. He was not yet quite able to stand, but he wanted to see what was coming.

Legolas gestured to Thorin again and then shrugged, his voice a little slower and calmer now that violence was not imminent. Thranduil was silent for a few beats before turning to consider Thorin. Thorin stayed still, like a rabbit unsure whether it was safer to be motionless or to flee.

“So, it is merely a coincidence that a party of orcs has invaded my kingdom on the same day that you escape and a messenger from your grandfather arrived? Is that what you would have me believe, dwarf?” Thranduil asked, gliding closer.

Thorin straightened, hope flaring in his heart. “A message from my grandfather? What did he say?”

Thranduil grabbed him by the throat, lifting him up and off his feet. Thorin gasped from shock, though being choked certainly didn’t help. Thranduil’s grip was as tight as any noose.

“That was not what I asked you, Thorin,” Thranduil said calmly, as if Thorin was not dangling at the end of his arm, struggling like a fish on a hook. “I asked if you have found a way to communicate with the outside world. _Answer_ me.”

“You paranoid, tree-fucking, piece of-AH!” Thorin hissed as Thranduil’s grip tightened. He felt the delicate bones in his throat creak in protest. He wheezed, “No! No! Mahal’s sake, you are the only person I’ve spoken to in a week.” Thranduil’s grip tightened further and black spots danced in front of his vision. “Stop!” 

Thranduil squeezed harder.

With the last of his air, Thorin gasped out, “Please.”

When Thranduil finally released him, Thorin barely noticed hitting the floor. He was too busy sucking in air like he had been drowning. Perhaps it would be best to just lie there on the floor for the foreseeable future? Yes, that seemed like a good plan.

Thranduil had turned away and was speaking to Legolas again, so Thorin closed his eyes and focused on breathing. His body had been through quite a bit in just a few hours and he wondered how many bruises and aches he would have on the morrow. He heard movement above him and looked up find Thranduil kneeling over him.

“Legolas tells me you took a drink of water while in the forest,” Thranduil said, his tone light and his eyes narrow.

Thorin nodded.

“How unfortunate for you,” Thranduil said. He laid his hand across Thorin’s brow. “You’ll sleep for much of the next day or so, and I do not imagine your dreams will be pleasant. A fitting enough punishment, I think. Enjoy the dungeons.”

Thorin’s exhaustion took him suddenly and almost violently, perhaps aided by Thranduil’s magic. He was falling into a deep slumber before the Elvenking had even finished speaking.

He dreamed of Erebor, and the dream would not stop. He felt fire lick up his spine and through his hair and he _burned_ even though he should have been nothing but ashes by that point. Around him, his people went up in flames. His mother and father, his grandfather, his sister and brother. There was nothing but the flames and the feeling of the mountain coming down around him. It happened again and again, and each time the horror was new and gleaming.

The dream might have lasted minutes or hours. Thorin had no way of estimating time at all. When he finally awoke, he was barely aware of it. He saw darkness, broken only by the gleam of Thranduil’s hair and eyes as the Elvenking stared down at him.

“Your screaming is disturbing the guards,” Thranduil said.

Thorin saw only Erebor, could think only of dragonfire. “Help us,” he croaked, reaching out a hand towards Thranduil. “Please, help. Don’t leave. Please.”

The expression that passed over Thranduil’s face was complex, and he looked away from Thorin as if to hide it. He murmured something under his breath before unlocking the cell and slipping inside. Thorin grabbed the fabric of his cloak as if to force him to stay.

“Don’t leave, you must stay, we need help,” Thorin babbled, his grasp on reality shaky and confused.

“Shhh,” Thranduil said, his voice softer than Thorin had ever heard. He sat down on floor beside Thorin. “Shh, come here.”

He made no move to stop the dwarf as he practically climbed onto him. Instead, Thranduil laid his hand across Thorin’s forehead and whispered something that Thorin could not understand. He felt a sudden warmth flood his veins, as if he’d just stepped inside from the bitter cold. The terror that had held him and gripped him for what must have been hours was washed away, replaced by a feeling of safety. And exhaustion, profound exhaustion.

“Don’t leave,” Thorin murmured, his head already nodding onto Thranduil’s shoulder as true sleep overtook him at last.


	8. Chapter 8

When Thorin awoke again, he felt as though he might actually have died at some point in the night and been dragged back to life kicking and screaming. There was not an inch of him that did not hurt in some way, and exhaustion still clung to him like a shroud. The forest had taken its toll on him and its grip was not so easily loosened.

Also, he had a bit of spider web tangled in his hair. Disgusting.

The cell was a considerable downgrade from his small room, although Thorin had to admit that as cells went, it could have been worse. His bed was little more than a small wooden frame with a layer of padding, but the blanket was warm and it was better than sleeping on a stone floor. 

Thorin forced himself to sit up, even though his back and shoulders screamed in protest at the movement. He stretched carefully, trying to make his stiff muscles loosen just a little. He rose to his feet slowly, testing each step to ensure his legs wouldn’t buckle. When he reached the bars of his cell, he gave them a rattle. Good construction, strong metal, firmly anchored. The wood-elves made their cells well, unfortunately.

There was no sign of any guards, so Thorin teetered back to the bed and sat down. He put his head in his hands and recoiled in pain. The left side of his face was apparently very swollen. He supposed that wasn’t surprising, given the beating it had taken yesterday. There were no reflective surfaces in the cell, so Thorin just poked at his face until he had a general idea of how big the bruise was. Very big, as it turned out. His split lip had healed almost completely, however, aside from some lingering tenderness. Thorin thought he ought to focus on the positives, however miniscule they might be. 

He laid back against the bed and stared at the rough-hewn stone ceiling, following the grain of the rock with his eyes. Sleep still lurked at the edges of his mind, tugging his eyelids down, and Thorin lay half-awake for nearly an hour before he heard the footsteps of a guard. He considered feigning sleep, but he knew they would eventually figure out that he was awake, if only because they’d send someone in to check his pulse. Better to face it head on and not risk the tempers of the elves. Especially the temper of one elf in particular.

His bruises throbbed as if in agreement. Thorin swung his legs over the edge of the bed and waited for the guard to approach.

“Ah, you’re awake,” said the guard as he peered into Thorin’s cell. “Are you coherent, or still shouting about fire?”

Thorin favored the guard with his most princely glare and did not otherwise respond.

“King Thranduil has ordered that you be brought to him,” the guard said, leaning a hip against the bars of the cell. “Unbound, if you are agreeable, and in chains if you are not. Do you feel agreeable?”

Thorin wondered if Thranduil had commanded the guard to use those exact words, wondered if the entire forest was not a group of puppets dancing on Thranduil’s strings. Thorin bared his teeth and said, “I’m always agreeable.”

They left him unbound, but it was clear the guards did not trust him in the least. Thorin was escorted to Thranduil’s quarters by a party of six elves (before it had only been two) and their hands never strayed far from their weapons. He wondered if Thranduil had unleashed some of his fury at them for letting Thorin escape. Thorin hoped so. If he had to suffer, someone else deserved to as well.

Thorin managed to hold on to that anger and bravado all the way into Thranduil’s quarters. The guards did not lead him into the small dining room, but instead down a set of stairs into the private bath. Thorin had only been here once, while exploring Thranduil’s quarters, and the pool had been empty then. Now it was full and steaming slightly, the lights in the room glittering off the water and reflecting from small crystals hewn into the ceiling. 

It was an inviting scene, but Thorin had scant time to appreciate it. Thranduil stood by the edge of the pool, and Thorin froze upon seeing him. The guards had to push him forward.

Thranduil stared at Thorin for a long moment, and Thorin stared back wide-eyed. He did not look away, the same way he would not have looked away from a wolf that had crossed his path. Thranduil broke the stare first, nodding at his guards and dismissing them. Being left alone with Thranduil was not, Thorin found, overly reassuring.

But Thranduil simply glided over to him, fingers splaying gently across Thorin’s chin to tilt his head up. “This should heal in a few days.”

Thorin jerked his chin out of Thranduil’s grip, but did not say ‘I would not need to heal in the first place, were it not for you.’ He was not feeling quite that bold anymore. Instead, he simply glared up at the Elvenking and let the anger in his eyes speak for him.

If Thranduil was moved by his rage, he showed no sign of it. Instead, he simply said, “Bathe. You’ve been doused in webbing and orc blood, and it is beginning to smell.”

Thorin let out an angry huff of breath, but the prospect of bathing was very tempting. Thorin had become used to bathing in water that was warmed bucket by bucket and cooled quickly. A long, effortless soak in hot water sounded heavenly. He dipped his fingers into the water and tasted it. Minerals, unmined rock, and faint bits of plant matter; Thranduil’s bath was fed by a natural hot spring, most likely. Erebor had possessed an elaborate system of pipes and furnaces that could deliver hot or cold water with merely the turn of a lever anywhere in the mountain. The water there had tasted of good, familiar things like metal and clean rock.

“Thorin?”

Thorin jumped a little, startled, and realized that he had been staring at the water without speaking. He grunted, “Just thinking,” and began tugging his shirt over his head.

It was not until he turned to place his clothing on a small stool by the side of water that he caught sight of the mirror that hung on the wall. His reflection made him wince. The bruise that he’d been poking at earlier was indeed truly massive, and it looked as if a pony had stomped on his face. Further down his neck, he could see long, purple-black marks in the shape of Thranduil’s fingers. He tilted his neck up to see the extent of the damage.

The Elvenking was watching him, Thorin realized. Thranduil stood by the edge of the pool, motionless, his enormous eyes fixed on Thorin. Thorin swallowed, suddenly very aware of his nudity. He turned from the mirror and slipped into the pool without a word, only looking up at Thranduil once he was submerged up to his shoulders. Thranduil still did not take his eyes off of him, and finally Thorin had to speak just to break the silence.

“You hit hard for someone who’s beardless.”

The corner of Thranduil’s mouth quirked upwards, just slightly. “A high compliment, to be sure.” 

Thranduil’s mood seemed almost merry, a far cry from the wild rage of yesterday. Thorin felt himself relax, the fear easing into back into simple wariness. Thranduil’s good moods tended to bode well for him.

No longer worried that he was about to have the life beaten out of him, Thorin dunked his head into the water, wanting all traces of the spider web out. There was nothing quite like the simple pleasure that was being completely submerged in warm bathwater. He breathed out and let himself sink to the lowest step of the pool. How wonderful would it have been to simply lay there on the warm tile, weightless and careless for the rest of his life? Dwarves had no great fondness for water, but surrounded by comfortable heat, Thorin thought he might come to love it after all.

Thorin stayed on the bottom of the pool until his lungs burned. When he finally broke the surface, he did so with reluctance. Still, he felt remarkably better for his brief time underwater, possibly because the spider webs were finally out of his hair.

“Oh good, I was worried you were planning to drown yourself,” Thranduil drawled. 

The Elvenking had moved while Thorin was underwater, seating himself in front of the large mirror. As Thorin watched, more fascinated than he would admit to, Thranduil drew an ivory comb through his long, pale hair. So elvish hair did not fall preternaturally into place through sheer force of will. That was useful enough information, Thorin thought, watching the teeth of the comb as it parted a long, silvery wave of hair.

Thranduil’s eyes met Thorin’s in the mirror and Thorin realized he had been staring. Scowling, Thorin turned away and began scrubbing himself roughly with the soap that sat in a small basket beside the pool. The soap smelled faintly of flowers, and Thorin rolled his eyes. _Elves._

“I was mistaken yesterday when I accused you of being in league with the orcs,” Thranduil said, in lieu of nothing, still looking steadily at his own reflection. “I’m relieved to have been mistaken, in this case.”

The Elvenking went silent, and Thorin realized that this might have been an apology, or at least as close to one as Thranduil would produce. He folded his arms on the edge of the pool to prop himself up. “If you hadn’t been shouting at me and slapping me across the room, I might have told you that myself.”

If Thranduil felt guilty, there was no sense in not using that to his advantage.

Thranduil turned, and the look on his face might best be described as ‘withering’. Thorin’s cheeks colored, but he tilted his chin up defiantly. Thranduil’s lips quirked again, just slightly, and he turned back to the mirror.

“What’s the great worry if a few orcs enter your forest, anyway?” Thorin asked curiously. “It’s huge and full of wild things that can probably defend themselves against an orc or two.” 

One of the first lessons he’d learned at his father’s knee was that Thranduil was an isolationist and deeply reluctant to let anyone into his territory, but he had never been given a firm reason for that. Most of Erebor’s diplomats had simply assumed that it was elvish snobbery. 

“I am king of those wild things,” Thranduil said, putting the comb down. “And the darkness that spills across the woods is unnatural and corrupting. The orcs are harbingers of that.”

“So the spiders weren’t always here? Because I have always wondered what mad folly would lead anyone to settle someplace where giant spiders lived and thrived.”

“The spiders are new,” Thranduil said. In the mirror, his expression was distant and sad. “The wretched creatures have only established a foothold in the last century.”

Ah. ‘New’ had a different definition for dwarves and elves, it seemed. Thorin scrubbed his toes absently as Thranduil continued speaking.

“Before the darkness and the spiders, Greenwood was the most magnificent forest in all the world. It rivaled Lothlorien, and I would wager any wood in Valinor as well. You cannot imagine its beauty, princeling. In all your life, you’ve never seen anything like it.”

Despite himself, Thorin wanted to smile. He had never seen anyone look simultaneously starry-eyed and arrogant, but Thranduil was managing. But Thorin did not think Thranduil would welcome that observation, even if it was not malicious. Instead, he said gruffly, “I doubt I’d have cared either way. Forests are just forests, Elvenking. Nothing but trees and birds and smug elves.”

“And are mountains merely mountains, then?” Thranduil asked, twisting to look directly at Thorin again. “Nothing but rocks and caves and ill-tempered dwarves?”

That was _different_. What did elves know of the complexity of the earth, of what lay in the deep and cavernous places away from the sun? Thranduil had never lain miles below the surface, his fingers dug deep into rock and soil, and felt his heartbeat pulse in time to the slow thrum of the world itself.

But he did not know how to say any of that. Thorin was no poet, and his training as a diplomat had temporarily fallen to the wayside amidst the struggle to survive. So instead he just murmured in Khuzdul, “ _Smug elves would not understand._ ”

“Reign in your surliness, Thorin, no matter how naturally it comes to you,” Thranduil said lightly, correctly guessing that Thorin’s mutterings were not complimentary. “Otherwise, I will leave you here during the negotiations.” 

“Negotiations?” Abruptly, Thorin realized that his memory of a messenger from his grandfather was not merely something his fevered mind had conjured as a lifeline. At least some of his memories from the day before were accurate. “My grandfather is ransoming me?”

“Indeed,” Thranduil said, looking as pleased as a cat with a mouse between its claws. “It seems a week’s wait is long enough to allow him to save face.”

“Why am I wasting time with this, then?” Thorin said, shooting to his feet. He shook his head rapidly, sending water flying from his hair, and started climbing out of the pool.

“Stop that immediately,” Thranduil hissed, wiping water off his face. “We have several hours yet before we depart, and you are desperately in need of a bath.”

“Bah!” Thorin growled, sinking back into the water and glaring at Thranduil like an angry bullfrog. Still, he remembered that royal processions were never quick affairs, whether the royals were elves, dwarves, or men. He probably had time to scrub until his skin bled and there would still be several hours to idle. 

He finished bathing himself about the same time Thranduil was done fussing with his hair. Thorin could see no difference in the final product, as it was still a smooth, mithril-bright wave, but Thranduil seemed satisfied with it.

“When do we leave?” Thorin asked, squeezing the water out of his hair.

“Hours from now,” Thranduil said, with all the condescending patience of a father explaining that there will be no sweets before dinner. “Before then, we eat.”

Thorin scowled. Patience had never been a virtue he’d desired to cultivate.

He fidgeted his way through breakfast, tapping his fingers rapidly on the table and glancing continuously out the window to gauge the sun’s position. The food on his plate was tasteless and unimportant as far as he was concerned, and he was far too anxious to be hungry. His thoughts were consumed with the possibility of rejoining his people and being free of the forest and its king. It wasn’t until he caught his reflection in a silver serving dish that Thorin remembered that he was barefaced.

He swore and ducked his head against his shoulders. His cheeks flushed, as he couldn’t help but remember how embarrassingly _bare_ they were. It would be humiliating enough for his family to see him like this, but the thought of all of the attendants who would be traveling with his grandfather looking at his beardless face…

“You look as if you are choking on something.” The Elvenking’s voice was light and amused, and it made Thorin glare.

“You! Find me something to cover my face!” Thorin demanded.

Thranduil leaned back in his chair and raised an eyebrow.

“You’re the reason I’m as barefaced as a babe, so you ought to be the one to fix it,” Thorin said, pounding a fist on the table. He was not going to beg, not with freedom so close, but he might have allowed his expression to plead, just a bit. No one would know.

Thranduil’s good mood had apparently made him generous, because after a moment he said, “Ah, very well. We have a few hours yet. Perhaps there’s something dwarf-sized to be found in my halls.”

“Thank you,” Thorin said, tried to sound magnanimous rather than pathetically grateful.

Despite being reassured that he would not be marched before his own people looking like some kind of disgrace, Thorin was still almost painfully tense. When breakfast ended, he paced in frustrated circles until Thranduil finally lost his temper and banished Thorin to the library to wait. This did not improve Thorin’s mood in the slightest.

Three hours passed, and Thorin spent most of them fidgeting, failing to absorb anything he was reading, and staring out the window. He hated this idle time, especially because he was so unused to it. He could not shake the feeling that there was something he should be doing. Thorin knew that it was only habit rather than actual need that gave him this feeling, but it plagued him nonetheless. Perhaps he could sneak out of the library and down to the music room? That would give his hands something to do, at the very least. 

And yet, despite all that boredom, Thorin was still startled enough that he leapt from his seat when Thranduil entered the room. He blamed the nerves that were still jangling inside of him like a badly-tuned instrument.

“Standing when I enter?” Thranduil smirked, and leaned against the tall, oaken staff that he carried. “How uncharacteristically respectful of you.”

Thorin glared at him and turned his attention to the bundle of dark blue fabric in Thranduil’s arms. “What’s that there?”

“As you requested,” Thranduil said, handing the bundle over to him, “something to hide yourself in.”

Thorin unrolled the fabric and held it before him. It was a travelling cloak, one that looked to be his size and equipped with both a large hood and a strip of thin fabric that stretched across the lower half of his face. Thorin tried it on and discovered that the strip of fabric latched onto a small hook in the side of the hood. He glanced at himself in mirror and was pleased with what he saw. With the hood up and the fabric across his face, only his eyes were visible, and he had a rakish look about him, like a bandit. More importantly, he did not look like he was trying to hide something shameful.

He turned to Thranduil and lowered the hood. Thorin was tempted to say something dismissive about how the cloak would do, but…Thranduil had not needed to bring him the cloak, had not needed to go out of his way. It had been a favor, done without asking for something in return. And yes, Thranduil had been the _reason_ he needed the cloak in the first place, but Thorin was so very close to going home. A bit of civility would not be out of place, here at the end of his stay.

“Thank you,” he said, nodding at Thranduil. 

The Elvenking nodded back his expression solemn in a way that seemed to come naturally to the elves. He was dressed more formally than Thorin had seen him since arriving, carrying a tall oaken staff and a heavy, richly embroidered travelling cloak. His woodland crown was perched upon his head, with deep green leaves and pale yellow flowers strung across the ‘branches’. “Come along. We are preparing to leave.”

Around them, the palace was a bustle of activity. The farther their path took them from Thranduil’s quarters, the more stares Thorin felt on him. He had briefly forgotten that to most of the elves in the palace, their dwarf prisoner was an unseen mystery. He resisted the urge to put his hood up and hide underneath it. The elves were staring because he was a dwarf, and that would not change if he was hooded. So he kept his chin up and pretended as if he could not see them at all.

Thranduil turned suddenly, heading up a winding spiral staircase that had been hewn from the rock. Thorin felt his heart leap in excitement; they were going up, so that meant that they were finally going out. Out of the palace, out of the woods, out of Thranduil’s lands entirely. Thorin couldn’t help but smile as he stepped out of the cave and onto a wide, sunny clearing of grass.

Thranduil’s royal procession was milling about in the meadow, made up of a dozen finely-dressed elves on horses and a guard of ten archers. The diplomats, like Thranduil, were clad in shades of gold and green. Even the horses were finely dressed, their livery green to match their masters and flowers braided into their manes. In the warm sunlight of the clearing, the gathering looked almost magical, like something out of a child’s story.

Thranduil caught him staring. He did not smile, but was clearly pleased.

“You elves will take any excuse to bedeck yourselves, won’t you?” Thorin said, pretending to be very fascinated with what the horses were doing.

“It is a day of celebration,” Thranduil said, looking out over his procession with satisfaction. Thorin had to admit that this portion of the woods _was_ lovely, free from the strange, heavy darkness that had terrified him so. For the first time, Thorin had some inkling of what Mirkwood must have been like long before he’d been born.

“So eager to be rid of me?” Thorin asked, feeling bold enough to smile a bit even though it stretched his bruises painfully.

“I am eager to regain what belongs to me.”

Whatever retort Thorin might have conjured died on his tongue as a happy cry rose up from the elves in the meadow. The reason soon became clear as Legolas emerged from thick forest, leading…

 _By Mahal’s braided beard_ , Thorin thought, eyes widening.

Following Legolas like a loyal hound was an enormous elk, one that Thorin recognized. Granted, Thorin had no real proof that it was the elk he’d seen Thranduil riding on the day that Smaug had attacked, but how many elk the size of bears could there possibly be in the world? His eyes shot to Thranduil, wondering if this was some last cruelty the Elvenking meant to visit on him, but Thranduil was not even looking at him. Instead, the elf was practically radiating happiness as he walked forward and reached out to tangle his fingers in thick brown fur. The elk sniffed his hair and snorted twice before nosing at his neck affectionately.

“I found him beneath the apple trees,” Legolas said, his expression dangerously close to merry. “Doubtlessly waiting for the apples to ripen and ferment, the lush.”

“Ah, he simply knows the value of distraction in these trying times,” Thranduil said, giving the massive beast an affectionate pat. Without even glancing backwards, Thranduil added, “Thorin, stop backing away before you trip over your own feet.”

Thorin had not even noticed that he’d been slowly backing up, instinct calling for him to put considerable distance between himself and anything that might crush his head with one blow from its hoof. He forced himself to stop, letting his heels dig into the grass. “Just getting a better look at this creature. Is it the same one you…the same one as before?”

“Yes,” Thranduil said, smoothing his hand along the elk’s neck. “He enjoys his trips out of the wood.”

“How unfortunate that he’s owned by you, then.”

Thranduil smiled, but it was sharper and tinged with a hint of the wildness that Thorin often saw in the Elvenking’s eyes. “He is owned by no one He and I have an agreement. And fortunately for you, he’s agreed to bear you out of the forest for our meeting.”

The prospect of even getting closer to the elk, let alone atop it, was deeply unpalatable to Thorin. For Mahal’s sake, the creature was taller than Thranduil and its antlers were wider than Thorin was tall. So he shook his head and said, “I’ll take a horse.”

He’d have little to no chances of controlling one like he could a pony, since his feet couldn’t reach the oversized stirrups that horses required. But at least he wouldn’t be gored to death on an enormous set of antlers.

Thranduil moved fluidly, hefting himself atop the elk with what seemed like no effort at all. The beast was not fitted with a saddle, just a bridle and reins, but the Elvenking settled atop it comfortably. Apparently, elves were not all that concerned about falling off their mounts.

“It isn’t your decision to make,” Thranduil said, all arrogance and amusement. “Legolas?”

Thorin was seized suddenly and lifted into the air. He snarled and kicked, but Thranduil’s accursed son did not release him. Instead, he was forced up onto the elk in front of Thranduil. He was tempted to pitch himself off the side out of spite, but that would bring him within striking distance of the elk’s hooves and he didn’t trust the beast not to buck.

Instead, he looked over at Legolas, now at eye-level, and snarled, “If you pick me up again, I’m going to chew your ear off and shove it down your throat.”

Legolas just glared at him and said something in Elvish. Thorin doubted it was complimentary.

“Well done,” Thranduil said, not bothering to hide his amusement. He was surprisingly warm against Thorin’s back. His arms came around Thorin’s sides to grip the reins, and Thorin was very abruptly penned in.

Legolas said something else, looking up at his father quizzically. The two of them had a short conversation, and Thorin vowed that his first order of business upon finally being home was going to be learning Elvish. He’d had more than enough of being talked about like he wasn’t there and being unable to understand a word.

The conversation concluded, Thranduil twitched the reins and the elk moved forward to the front of the procession. Thorin inched forward so that his back was not pressed flush to Thranduil. At least the elk was large enough that he did not have to curl into the Elvenking like a child just learning to ride. 

The elk’s gait was different enough from a pony’s that Thorin felt unbalanced, and after a moment of hesitation, he curled his hands into the beast’s fur. It was coarse, though he could feel the tips of a soft undercoat when he dug his fingers in. Thorin had expected the elk to smell musty, like all shaggy things that lived in the wild, but instead it smelled of leaves and wood. The same scents its master carried.

Thorin glanced back at Thranduil, who himself was looking back at his assembled party. Whatever he saw must have satisfied him, because he called out something that sounded like a command and then nudged the elk forward. Apparently, the journey was now officially underway. As the elk and horses trotted away from the palace, Thorin glanced backwards at the meadow. Legolas and a company of the guards were watching, all of them armed, and all of them looking intent.

“Is your charming son not accompanying us, then?” Thorin asked.

“He has his duties elsewhere.”

Something was niggling at Thorin’s mind, like a splinter under the skin, but he could not quite get a hold of it. “Quite trusting of you to bring less than a dozen soldiers, considering you’ve taken a prince hostage.”

“My nature is a trusting one,” Thranduil said, completely deadpan, and Thorin almost snickered. “Do not worry yourself over it. Soon enough, you’ll be back amongst your people and I will be reunited with a bit of my wealth.”

“Maybe this time you’ll have the sense not to hide it in the woods like a mad squirrel,” Thorin said. The trees closed over them and he had to fight back a shudder. The forest was still normal, the sunlight filtering down through bright green leaves, but Thorin could not shake the memory of the deep wood’s darkness from his mind.

“Gathering all that you own in one place is dangerous,” Thranduil said. His voice took on a distant tone. “It invites misfortune and ruin.”

“Is that what we did, then?” Thorin asked, eyes narrowing. He twisted to look up at Thranduil. “Invited misfortune and ruin?”

“I did not say that.” Thranduil was not looking at him at all. His gaze was unfocused as he stared out across his forest. “But I did warn your grandfather that his hoard might summon a creature capable of taking it, yes.”

“And you think you’re any safer, any better off?” Thorin asked, outrage coloring his voice. “You think having your little treasure chests in different trees means you are insulated from dragons and orcs and all manner of evil? If your forest burns, you’ll be as penniless and alone as I am. Moreso, even, because we didn’t hide in our mountain and refuse all contact with the world outside-”

Thranduil’s grabbed Thorin’s hair in one hand and yanked his head backwards, forcing Thorin to bend painfully backwards and stare straight up at the Elvenking. The pressure was enough to bring tears to his eyes, but he just snarled wordlessly up at Thranduil instead. For a moment, he believed he was going to be tossed off the elk and trampled. Instead, Thranduil released his grip abruptly and shoved Thorin forward.

“You’re my prisoner for another hour at most. Do us both the enormous favor of staying quiet for the duration.”

Thorin could see the wisdom in not arguing that. So he fell silent, listening to the melodic chatter of the elves behind him. Around him, the forest grew darker and the air heavier, but the elves seemed unconcerned. The path they were on had not failed them yet, evidently.

He was so eager to see some sign of his people that several times he tilted forward, sure he saw sunlight and heard voices through the trees up ahead. But each time, it turned out to be nothing, and Thorin was reminded of the strange, hallucinatory nature of the woods. It was not until after a half hour of travel, when Thranduil murmured, “We are near,” that Thorin realized the voices he was hearing and the smoke from campfires he could smell was all real.

His heart soared. He was nearly home.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to everyone who has kept reading this story in spite of the delays! I just finished my final semester of college \o/ so hopefully updates to the story will come at a faster pace.

So close to the edge of the forest, Thorin’s focus was completely on the wide, green plain of grass that he could see through the gaps in the trees. When the branches up ahead rustled, he dismissed it as a bird or some other arboreal creature. The elves did not. Thorin heard the creak of bowstrings and wood behind him and felt Thranduil tense up against his back. Belatedly, he realized that many of the smaller creatures had probably been driven from the woods or hunted to extinction by the spiders.

“Not a bird?” he murmured to Thranduil.

“Unlikely,” Thranduil replied.

The branches shook again, and Thorin squinted up at the tree. It would take a bold orc indeed to deliberately place itself between a party of elves and an entire camp of dwarves. Something at the back of his mind was calling for his attention, something loud and strident as-

“No!” Thorin shouted, surging upwards in horror. “No, hold fire!”

 _They will not listen to me,_ he realized, twisting in his seat to see that the archers had not taken their eyes off their target in the tree.

“Tell them not to shoot!” Thorin hissed to Thranduil, his tone somewhere between furious and beseeching. Thranduil merely raised an eyebrow, and Thorin realized he wanted an explanation. “I think it is my brother up there in that tree. I think it’s Frerin.”

To Thorin’s profound relief, Thranduil immediately called out an order that made the archers lower their bows. Thorin wriggled off the elk and Thranduil let him go. It was not until he was almost directly under the tree that Thorin again heard the creak of bowstrings. Insurance, presumably, in case Thorin was wrong.

“Frerin, if that’s you up there, then you need to come down slowly, you mad little bastard,” Thorin called up, teeth gritted. 

His knees went weak when a familiar blonde head popped out of the leaves. Frerin was dangling upside down, his legs hooked easily around a branch. “Thorin! I didn’t know that you would be coming along yourself! I thought it would be ano—Mahal’s stones, what happened to your beard?”

“I shaved it so that I’d look just like you,” Thorin retorted. “Now get yourself out of that tree! Right now!”

“Stop shouting, I’m coming,” Frerin grumbled, swinging back up onto the branch to begin making his way down.

Behind him, Thorin could hear the crackle of leaves as the elk came closer. He didn’t bother to turn around, keeping all his attention on his brother. Thranduil said, “I was under the impression dwarves weren’t fond of the treetops.”

“Frerin doesn’t have the sense Mahal gave a turnip,” Thorin said, shaking his head in dismay. So much for all of his sage advice about staying on the ground where it was safe.

“I heard that!” Frerin shouted, dropping the final few feet out of the tree gracefully. Once his boots were on the ground, he happily flung himself towards Thorin and gave him a brotherly headbutt. The _crack_ of their skulls meeting broke the quiet of the forest, and Thorin was glad for it.

“Dis has missed you like mad,” Frerin said, grinning from ear to ear. “And I have too!” His smile dropped away as he glanced at Thorin’s chin. “But I was being serious, what happened to your beard?”

Thorin opened his mouth to answer.

He closed it again abruptly.

In all his fretting about being seen without his beard, he’d neglected to worry over how he would actually explain it. He ought to have told the truth, because then Thranduil would be known as the sort of creature who dishonored and humiliated his prisoners. The world would know that not only would the Elvenking not lift a finger to save his allies, but he could not even be kind to those under his power. And then one day, when Erebor was reclaimed and Mirkwood crushed beneath their boots, Thorin could drag the elf into the mountain, cut off every last lock of silvery-blonde hair, and all the dwarves of Arda would know that Thorin was within his rights. Thranduil would _deserve_ it.

But the idea of telling the story made Thorin squirm, and the idea of others hearing it made him nearly retch. Could he stand to have his father or his grandfather or Balin picturing him being held in Thranduil’s lap, wriggling and helpless? 

No. No, he could not.

“I was injured,” Thorin said, the words spilling from his mouth without much of a plan behind them. “There are orcs in these woods, you see, creeping about, and I was wielding an axe against them. You know how I hate to run from battle, and I wanted to see if the wood elves had any skill in combat.”

Behind him, the elk huffed out a hot breath that ruffled Thorin’s hair. He had the distinct sense that it was unimpressed with him. Frerin, though, was nodding with wide eyes.

“And one of the orcs grabbed me by the throat and dashed my head against the ground. I was unconscious, and the elves were worried I was badly injured. They’re beardless and ignorant, and so they…” Thorin made a twitching motion that hopefully conveyed a razor being drawn across skin. “They were trying to ensure I was unhurt, but…”

“Oh, Thorin,” Frerin said, eyes wide with horror. He came forward and carefully put his hands on Thorin’s bare cheeks. His brother’s thumbs were already developing calluses from his axe, and Thorin was struck with how much Frerin had grown since Erebor. He was only a few years younger than Thorin, but he had always been so carefree and untroubled. To see him looking serious now was bittersweet and it made Thorin want to pull his brother into an embrace and never release him.

“It will grow back,” he mumbled, resting his hands on Frerin’s shoulders and squeezing gently.

Frerin smiled at him, and then his gaze drifted past Thorin and darkened considerably. “I thought elves were supposed to be wise! You can’t even check for a wound through a beard!”

Thorin turned to look up at Thranduil’s impassive face, and for a terrifying moment he was sure that Thranduil would call him a liar and tell Frerin the real tale of how Thorin’s beard had been lost. But Thranduil merely raised an eyebrow and said, “We are wise enough to know that vanity is a small price to pay compared to life. Well met, Prince Frerin.”

Frerin’s eyes widened, and Thorin intercepted him before he could lunge at Thranduil and the elk. “Enough, Frerin, go back into the camp!”

“But he-”

“He is ransoming me back, aye? So go back to the camp.” Thorin considered for a moment. “And stay out of these woods.”

“Stones and stars, they’re just woods.” Frerin was still glaring at Thranduil, but he had stopped trying to move towards him. “I can’t fathom why everyone is so afraid of them.”

Thorin wanted to tell him about orcs and spiders and terrifyingly real hallucinations, but Frerin had always lacked any sense of self-preservation. A forest full of monsters would sound like a grand adventure to him. Part of being an older brother, though, was knowing the weaknesses of his siblings, and so Thorin said, “Because it’s haunted.”

Frerin paled. “Haunted?” 

Thorin nodded solemnly. “Aye.

Frerin’s eyes narrowed. “By what?”

Thorin’s temper nearly got the best of him, and he badly wanted to retort ‘by the ghosts of thickheaded younger brothers who chose a poor time to become suspicious of campfire stories.’ But instead, he simply said, “By the spirits of vengeful elves, struck down in their prime by the creatures in these woods. They hold no love for dwarves, even in death.”

Frerin glanced behind Thorin, and Thorin chanced a peek upwards as well. Thranduil’s face was like stone, remote and cold as a mountaintop, and he nodded once. Frerin’s jaw twitched, and he murmured, “Ah, well, I would not want to disrupt the dead.”

“No, you would not.” Thorin clapped him on the shoulders once and offered a smile. “On with you, then. I’ll see you for supper tonight.”

Frerin grinned back at him, the tales of ghosts slipping away from his mind easily in the face of his happiness. He darted down the trail ahead of them, but Thorin did not fully relax until one of the elves called, “He’s out of the forest, my king.”

Thorin leaned against the tree and closed his eyes for a moment. He loved his family more dearly than anything in the universe, but they caused him no end of grief.

“As I said, you lie as smoothly as a king,” Thranduil said, a smile creeping across his face as he looked down at Thorin.

“You knew I would never tell them the truth, you awful, tree-fucking bastard,” Thorin snarled, glad to have some target for his frustration.

Thranduil’s lips quirked. “I assumed. Pride is as binding as any chain, and you have more pride than any creature could need in a hundred lifetimes.”

“I hope this elk gores you,” Thorin hissed, walking over to said elk and climbing up onto it by grabbing fistfuls of fur. “I hope that’s how you die, with a massive set of antlers through your chest.”

Thranduil actually _laughed_ , the sound free of any trace of mockery. “You are creative with your threats, I cannot fault you for that.”

Thorin just settled in front of him again, glowering at the elk’s neck. Thranduil’s arms came around him once more, fingers wrapped loosely around the elk’s reins, and then they were off again.

The path broke through the tree line only a few yards ahead of them, and Thorin had to stop himself from squirming in anticipation. He leaned around Thranduil to look backwards, happy to take in his last glimpse of the depths of Mirkwood. A thick mist seemed to be following them, for lack of a better term. It was pale white and wrapped gentle tendrils around the legs of the horses at the back of the procession. Wispy and insubstantial though it was, it was thick, and Thorin could not see the path behind them at all. He was sure the mist had not been there when they departed Thranduil’s palace, and he was equally sure it had not been there only a few minutes ago when they had met Frerin.

“Elvenking,” Thorin said, tightening his grip on the elk’s fur, “there’s a mist…”

“Do not worry yourself over it,” Thranduil said, not bothering to glance behind him.

“It’s not natural,” Thorin said, watching as it crept along behind them. It shrouded the entire forest, and Thorin shuddered at the thought of wandering lost in the woods without even being able to see.

“I suppose that depends on what you view as natural.” Thranduil reached up one pale hand to nudge Thorin’s chin forward. “As I said, do not let it worry you. We are not in danger.”

Thorin wanted to argue, but he supposed Thranduil knew his woods better than Thorin ever could. 

When the elk stepped from the woods, Thorin could hear a cry go up from the dwarven camp even though it was a good distance from the trees. He could not blame them; Thranduil was an imposing figure anyway, and the elk certainly did not detract from that. With a sigh, he put his hood up and fastened the strip of cloth across his face carefully. _Only a little longer now_.

As they approached, drumbeats rang throughout the camp. The sound of it was familiar and rhythmic, the specific tempo sending out a clear announcement to any dwarf who could hear it: ‘foreign royalty is approaching’. Ahead of them, Thorin could see civilians scattering off the camp’s main path as soldiers began to line the street in formation.

It was strange, to move amongst his own people while in the company of elves. The crowd of dwarves who had gathered behind the soldiers was silent, staring at the procession with looks that ranged from interest to openly hostility. He could see some of them whispering to each other, never taking their eyes off the elves. With only a few exceptions, every person in the camp had called Erebor home before Smaug’s attack. Thranduil was either very brave or very foolish to walk into such a place with only a handful of soldiers at his side. 

Thorin glanced back at the woods, half-expecting to see a much larger cohort of arriving to protect their king. But there was only the long, unbroken line of the trees, rendered blurry by the heavy mist. The mist did not extend onto the plain, fading off into nothingness a few feet from where the trees ended. Thorin turned away from Mirkwood resolutely; no sense in dwelling on its horrors when he would never have to see them again.

His grandfather’s tent was erected in the middle of the camp, the thick burgundy fabric towering over everything around it. Thorin’s heart leapt into his throat and he couldn’t help but smile. He was _home._ He felt as though he’d spent years trapped in the forest instead of merely a week. His thoughts raced away from the present and into the future, imagining a proper meal with his family and the laughter of his friends as he regaled them with stories.

A small group of elite guards stood watch around the entrance to King Thror’s tent, and their captain, Geim, stepped forward as Thranduil and the elk approached.

“King Thranduil,” Geim said, giving a respectful nod. He did a good job of not looking intimidated, despite the fact that Thranduil (probably deliberately) brought the elk to a halt a mere hairsbreadth away from the line of dwarves. Geim had to crane his neck to look up at them. 

“We are here to treat with King Thror regarding the ransom of his grandson,” Thranduil said, as if there were any other reason for the Elvenking to stroll out of the woods and into a camp full of dwarves who hated him.

“The king has ordered that he will see Prince Thorin before the negotiations take place,” Geim responded. He squinted up at Thorin with an unsure look.

“How many dwarves do you think hang about the forest for fun, Captain Geim?” Thorin said, leaning down so that Geim could make out his visible features a bit more clearly.

Geim smiled, the expression quick but pleased. “It’s good to see you once more, Your Majesty. Your grandfather awaits your presence.”

Thranduil leaned back, allowing Thorin to scramble off the elk and drop to the ground with some semblance of grace. Apparently, being out of his woods made Thranduil a bit more polite. Thorin strode forward into the tent without a second thought or a look backwards.

The air within the tent was heavy and warm. Thorin unhooked the cloth from across his face and pushed down his hood to better breathe in the scents of home. He could not stop smiling. Unmasked, he strode forward to the main chamber of the tent.

He had been expecting his father or Balin to also be in attendance, but it was just his grandfather in the tent. Thror leaned upon the armrests of the large, intricately carved wooden chair that served as a makeshift throne for travel. In the brief moment before he saw that Thorin had entered, he looked nothing like a king at all. He was simply a tired dwarf with the weight of years and responsibilities upon him. Then he looked up, saw Thorin, and his mouth dropped open in horror.

“My boy!” Thror gasped, striding from his throne to take Thorin by the shoulders. “Oh my boy, what has he done to you?”

“I’m all right,” Thorin said, relaxing against the broad expanse of his grandfather’s shoulder. It reminded him of being a child, when his grandfather would carry him to bed after a night of stories. It was a soothing memory, one that he had cherished all the more as his grandfather’s behavior became…erratic.

“Thorin?”

“Apologies,” Thorin said, realizing that he had not answered his grandfather’s question. He told the same story that had fooled Frerin, and the lie came easier now that Thorin had been able to practice it. He finished with, “So you see, it was all just a--a misunderstanding.”

“Thanks be to Mahal,” his grandfather said, hugging Thorin against him tightly once more. “Thranduil is harmless, he always has been, but the longer he kept you the more I began to worry.”

As entertaining as it was to imagine Thranduil’s expression upon being called ‘harmless’, his grandfather’s words did not reassure Thorin. Thranduil had been harmless once; what damage could even an army of elves do to a stronghold as mighty as Erebor? Especially when Erebor’s tunnels had reached far and deep, all but guaranteeing that the dwarves could outmaneuver any army foolish enough to try and lay siege to the mountain. But Erebor was lost to them and their allies in Dale were nothing but ashes. This close to the woods, the elves had the advantage and it was worrying that his grandfather could not see it.

“I was worried as well,” Thorin said, putting aside his concerns for the moment. “After I received your letter, I was sure you would not ransom me at all.”

Thror’s face grew heavy and sad. “I am sorry for my harsh words, my boy. I was so _angry,_ and felt so helpless. You understand, don’t you?”

 _No, not especially_ , Thorin wanted to answer. But there was no point in having that argument, as his grandfather was rarely interested in dissenting opinions lately. It was so different from the old days, when Thror had listened carefully to the advice of his counsel, taking long and silent walks through Erebor to reflect on what he had been told. “I understand. Our temper escapes us all, at times.”

Thror smiled at him and clapped him on the shoulder, and Thorin was immediately glad that he had decided not to argue. Seeing his grandfather happy was a rare and precious thing. Thror said, “I knew you would understand. Few kings are so lucky, to know that not only will their sons be fine heirs, but their grandsons as well.”

Warmth bloomed in Thorin’s chest. He ducked his head so that his delighted smile would be a little less obvious. “Thank you, grandfather.”

His grandfather stepped back to look him up and down. “So, besides your beard, you’re well? The Elvenking hasn’t hurt you?”

Thorin wanted to tell his grandfather about the deal he had made with Thranduil, about the gnawing fear those first few days when he was sure Thranduil was going to hurt him and hurt him terribly. He wanted to say that he feared the quickness of Thranduil’s mind and the deceptive strength in those willowy limbs. But shame choked him, turned the words to lead in his throat, and so Thorin just nodded stiffly. _Better to say nothing at all._

“Good, good,” Thror said. “I was worried that he might take his anger out on you, when the ransom falls through.”

Thorin cocked his head. He had misheard. Surely he had misheard? “What?”

Thror gave him a grave look. “I was not lying in my message to you. We do not have the funds for a prince’s ransom.”

“Then pay him a pauper’s ransom, it doesn’t matter to me!” Thorin snapped.

“Why?” Thror asked, rounding on him angrily. That at least was familiar; Thror no longer had any grip on his temper when faced with objections. “Why would I take food and clothing away from our people, when you have already made an agreement with him to be released in a month’s time?”

“Why did you bring me here at all, then?” Thorin barely restrained himself from grabbing his grandfather by the shoulders and shaking him. His grandfather, who had once called their family his most precious treasure and _meant_ it. How had he changed so much and so quickly?

“I needed to ensure that you were well, that he was not treating you cruelly,” Thror said, as if it was the most logical thing in the world. And the most terrible part was that Thorin could see the logic, even if that did not detract from the awful, stinging feeling of betrayal. 

“And if he had been treating me cruelly?” Thorin asked, hating the way his voice wavered.

“Then I would kill him now, while he is outside of his woods and vulnerable,” Thror said, waving a hand as if it was irrelevant. “It would be an easy matter.”

“He has not survived this long because he is a fool,” Thorin said, increasingly sure that Thranduil was not as defenseless as he seemed.

“I know him, Thorin.” Thror spoke as if Thorin was being an obstinate child. “You do not. I have spent more than a century dealing with him, and you have been in his company for all of a week. Are you really so selfish that you cannot bear to amuse yourself in his cells for three weeks more?”

The words that Thorin could not say were lodged in his chest and in his throat. His jaw stayed clamped together. He kept his head down, his gaze focused on the floor so that if there were tears in his eyes, no one would see them. All he could force out was, “Please. _Please_ do not make me stay with him any longer.”

Thror stared at him with honest bafflement. “Has he hurt you?”

 _Yes._ “No.”

“Then let this be a lesson,” Thror said. “A king must care for all his people, not merely the ones he loves.”

Thorin nodded stiffly, still unable to look at his grandfather.

“Now go. Visit with your brother and sister, for they have missed you very much. I will amuse myself wasting Thranduil’s time, and then I will see you again in only a few weeks.” Thror had already turned away from Thorin, walking back to his throne.

Thorin forced his feet to move, turning and walking slowly back out of the tent. So that was why his father and Balin were not there. He wondered distantly if Thror had told them of his plan or if he had simply left. Probably the latter.

He only barely remembered to pull the hood and cloth up over his head. _At least that is one less humiliation to suffer_ , he thought as he pulled the tent flap aside. Numbly, Thorin turned to Geim and said, “He is ready to speak with the Elvenking.”

Geim nodded, ordering several soldiers into the tent to take up their place at Thror’s side. Thranduil, though, did not move from atop the elk. “Thorin?”

Thorin looked up at his captor and forced his posture into something less obviously miserable. “Enjoy your negotiations, Elvenking.”

Then Thorin turned his back on the entire affair and walked away. Let the kings argue. He was going to see his siblings.  
***  
Thorin gambled that his brother and sister would be near the schooling tent. Officially, the tent had been created to give the children of the caravan some chance at an education. It was nothing like they would have received in the learning halls of Erebor, but Balin and a few other scribes were determined to give them something. Unofficially, the tent served as a gathering place for children, a point of stability in the ever-shifting chaos of a nomadic camp.

Sure enough, Frerin and Dis were in a meadow near the tent, tossing stones towards the dark, distant trees.

“Use more than just your arms,” Frerin was saying. “A good throw comes from the body, not just the arms.”

“Don’t let him lecture you on aiming, little jewel,” Thorin called out. He pulled his hood down. “Frerin aims like a drunk goat.”

Dis whirled around, shrieking in delight. Her messily-braided brown hair flew behind her as she darted across the meadow, and she did not bother to slow herself down as she threw herself into Thorin’s arms. Thorin just grunted from the impact and laughed. At fifteen, Dis was still light as a bird, lacking the sturdiness that dwarves gained later in life. Thorin twirled her several times before pulling her close.

“Thorin! I missed you, I missed you!” she babbled in his ear, her arms tight around his neck.

“I have only been gone for a week, you’ve been away from me for longer than that,” Thorin said, shifting her into a more comfortable position in his arms.

“This was different, you were far away and with _elves_ ,” Dis said, pulling back to give Thorin a serious look. “And where is your beard? I have more of a beard now!”

“Thorin and the elves were fighting goblins,” Frerin said, smiling fondly at his younger sister’s happiness. “He had a knock on his head and the elves shaved him to look for a wound. So never let anyone tell you elves are smart.”

Dis patted Thorin’s bare cheek gently. “It will grow back. Probably fast, because my beard is growing fast. See?” She gestured to the wisps of soft brown hair along her jawline.

Thorin nodded gravely. “Aye, soon it will be thicker than Frerin’s beard.”

“Oh no, you don’t get to tease anyone about their beards while you’re barefaced as a babe,” Frerin said, punching Thorin in the shoulder Dis was not leaning on.

Thorin hugged Dis tightly once more before putting her down. “How are you progressing on _The Book of the Fathers_ , little jewel?”

“I’m to the chapter on the founding of the Ironfists,” Dis said. She added proudly, “Balin says I will likely have it all memorized by the end of the year.”

Thorin smiled. It was a rite of passage for young dwarves to memorize the story of Mahal’s creation of their race and the lives of the seven Fathers of the Dwarves. Dis was a voracious reader, and it did not surprise him that she was easily committing the long tale to memory. “Go and fetch it, will you? We can read it together.”

Dis nodded, guileless, and darted into the maze of tents. Few books had survived Smaug’s attack on Erebor, but a scribe had managed to grab a copy of _The Book of the Fathers_ before escaping. It was a very simple version, lacking the elaborate illustrations and gilded pages of the copies in Erebor’s library, but it was complete. That was the most important part. Dis treated it like the treasure it was, and Balin had given her permission to keep it with her. Dis’ tent was usually near their grandfather’s, and fetching the book would keep her away for several minutes.

Thorin waited until Dis had vanished before turning to Frerin. “The ransom is going to fall through, Frerin. I won’t be having supper with you tonight after all.”

All the mirth fell away from Frerin’s face. “What?”

“In the forest, I made an agreement with the Elvenking, and he is to release me in a month,” Thorin explained. “Grandfather…he only wanted to ensure I was all right. He did not see the sense in paying a ransom when he knows I am to be released.”

“The sense is that it’s shameful not to ransom your own damned family!” Frerin snarled. “You cannot let him do this, Thorin!”

“What choice do I have?” Thorin snapped. He immediately regretted it, since Frerin was only worried for him. In a calmer voice, he said, “I am not going to bring a decade of worry and fear to a head while we are camped outside of elf-infested woods. This is not the time.”

“What better time than now, when we know Grandfather is willing to send us any of us off to be prisoners of the elves so he doesn’t have to part with anything shiny?” Frerin grabbed Thorin by the shoulder, his face imploring. “You can’t fool me. You’re _afraid_ to go back with that elf.”

“I’m more afraid of our people starving to death and warring with each other,” Thorin said. He leaned his forehead against Frerin’s. “Our family’s power hangs by a thread, Frerin. It will not survive a civil war.”

“It will not survive Grandfather, if he grows any worse,” Frerin said. “Please, Thorin. Do you think Father would stand for this? Do you think he wouldn’t take the throne himself to protect us?”

“Better that Father isn’t here, then.” Thorin rubbed his temples, feeling a headache coming on. “We cannot do this right now.” At Frerin’s mulish, angry look, Thorin added, “One day, when we are a little more secure and everything is less…less terrible, then we will talk with Father and decide what must be done. But not here, in this forsaken field outside an ugly forest.”

Perhaps Frerin heard the wisdom in his words, or perhaps Thorin looked more desperate than he’d intended to, but Frerin nodded after a moment of contemplation. He even offered Thorin a small, thin smile. “The both of us are too young and far too handsome to be so worried.”

Thorin laughed, the burst of humor unexpected and welcome. “So we are. Dis still believes I’m staying with the elves of my own choice, yes?”

Frerin looked offended. “Of course, do you think I’m going to tell my baby sister that our brother is a hostage? Especially _now_.”

“Good.” Thorin ran a hand through his hair. “I will be back before you know it, Frerin. It’s only for a few more weeks.”

Dis appeared a few seconds after that, carrying a massive, loosely bound book nearly as wide as her torso. “I found it! I’m at the part when the scouting party crosses the Red River, but we can start at the beginning of the chapter if you want to.”

And so they sat for the better part of an hour, leaning against the shady side of the tent with Dis tucked between her brothers. Thorin felt remarkably peaceful, the tension in his shoulders slowly unknotting as he listened to Dis read aloud. The peace could not last, of course. It was broken by the distant sound of shouting.

Thorin and Frerin both tensed. If a fight was truly breaking, they needed to get Dis to safety as quickly as possible. But after the initial ruckus, there was silence again. Thorin relaxed minutely. Hopefully, both kings had stomped to their respective corners.

“Dis, little gem, I think my stay is coming to an end,” Thorin said, doing his best to look cheerful. “The wood elves never like to venture out of their forest for very long.”

“I thought you were coming back to stay,” Dis said, concern and disappointment on her face. “Frerin said-”

“I misunderstood,” Frerin said, trying his best to sound glib and apologetic at the same time. “But Thorin will only be gone from us for a few weeks more.”

“Do you promise?” Dis asked, wearing a comically stern expression for such a young dwarf.

“On Mahal’s beard and his hammer,” Thorin said solemnly. 

An elf rounded the corner, coming to a halt when she saw them. Thorin recognized her as the Guard Captain. She looked at them uncertainly, glancing towards Dis with a look of worry.

“Hello, this is one of the elves,” Thorin said to Dis, moving very carefully as he stood up and walked forward. To the elf, he said, “Best tell him that I’m over here.”

The elf visibly relaxed upon hearing that Thorin was not going to put up a fight. She turned and loudly called out something in Elvish over her shoulder, her red hair flickering like a wave as she moved. 

“You’re an _elf_ ,” Dis said, startling Thorin and the Guard Captain both. She had shoved her book into Frerin’s arms and crept over to Thorin’s side to stare wide-eyed. It occurred to Thorin that this was probably the first time Dis had ever seen an elf up close.

“Yes,” the elf said, smiling cautiously. “Hello there. Are you Princess Dis?”

Dis nodded, taking a few steps closer to the elf like a cautious foal. Her jaw worked, and Thorin knew from experience that she had several hundred questions that she wanted to ask. But all she said was, “I like your bow.”

The elf surprised Thorin by kneeling down and unstrapping her bow to hold it out to Dis. Her voice was gentle as she said, “Thank you. It was a gift from my king.”

The Guard Captain was staring at Dis with obvious fascination. Thorin realized that elves probably did not see children very often, especially the isolated wood elves. He had heard that their birth rates were low, a product of immortal life keeping their populations steady. He wondered how long it had been since the Guard Captain had actually interacted with a child.

She wasn’t bad at it, Thorin decided, warming slightly to her despite himself. 

“It’s so big!” Dis laughed, reaching out to pluck at the string. “It’s as tall as me.”

“Some of our war bows are even taller,” the Guard Captain said with a smile. “The most powerful are even taller than me, and we must mount them on stands to even-”

“Tauriel!” Thranduil’s voice took them all by surprise. To her credit, the Guard Captain (Tauriel, apparently) recovered quickly, gently extracting her bow from Dis’ grip and turning to face her king.

Said king was an imposing sight, especially since he was clearly furious. The sight made Thorin flinch backwards instinctively. Perhaps if they had been alone, Thorin would have let himself back up. But he needed to convince Frerin and Dis that he was fine. Dis especially, since the sight of an angry elf quickly striding towards them had made her scuttle backwards to hide behind Thorin. Frerin stepped forward to stand next to his brother and rested his hand on Dis’ shoulder.

The three of them were not much of united front, but the sight gave Thranduil a pause. He glanced from Thorin to Dis to Frerin, his eyes flicking to Tauriel for a moment before going back to the dwarves. It reminded Thorin of a hunting dog examining the creatures around him, sorting out what was a threat and what was prey.

“Dis, this is King Thranduil,” Thorin said, finding his voice again. “He is the leader of the elves I’ll be staying with this month.”

Dis bowed her head, a quick and nervous movement.

Thranduil was paying no attention to her, his gaze back on Thorin. He tilted his head, the movement small and shrewd, and Thorin knew that Thranduil had just realized King Thror had never meant to ransom his grandson back at all.

“I would like to reach the palace again with plenty of daylight to spare, Prince Thorin,” Thranduil said. “Are you ready to leave?” 

His tone was still kingly, still commanding, but he spoke with more deference than he had ever bothered with before. Thorin felt a strange, fierce gratitude towards him. Thranduil knew that Thorin was putting on a show for his siblings, and the Elvenking was willing to play his part.

“Of course,” Thorin said. He pulled his hood over his head and buckled the fabric across his mouth, then turned to Frerin and Dis. “Come along, you can see me off.”

When they arrived in front of the king’s tent, the rest of the elves were already mounted and clearly prepared to leave. Thror was nowhere to be seen, and Thorin swallowed back his disappointment. A few dwarves had ventured close to gawk at Thranduil’s elk, but they quickly scattered at the sight of the Elvenking himself. Thranduil swung himself up onto the elk with the same preternatural grace as ever. The elk snorted in what Thorin assumed was a greeting. 

Tauriel had been on her king’s heels for the entire walk, but she paused before heading towards her own mount.

“It was good to meet you, Princess,” she said, giving a very low bow for Dis’ benefit.

Dis smiled for the first time since Thranduil has appeared. “It was good to meet you too!”

The sight of his sister’s happiness, even if it was just from seeing something strange and new, reassured Thorin. At least his sister would not remember this entire thing as a nightmare.

Frerin was another story entirely, and Thorin embraced him tightly. “Take care of things while I’m gone, and don’t do anything foolish?”

“Would I ever do anything foolish?” Frerin asked, giving Thorin a crooked smile.

“I am serious, Frerin.” 

Frerin’s expression was one of tired acceptance. “Yes, yes, I will keep things as sturdy and unchanging as a mountain.” He squeezed Thorin’s shoulder. “Worry about yourself, brother. Be safe.”

Thorin did his best to smile. “I’ll be perfectly safe. I promise to leave the elves to fight orcs for themselves from this day forward.”

He embraced his siblings one more time, trying not to linger too obviously. It was only a few more weeks. He would be with them again soon.

When he turned and strode towards the elk, Thranduil held a hand out to him. Thorin wanted to climb the beast barehanded just to spite him, but Dis was still watching with wide and worried eyes. So Thorin let himself be pulled up and settled in front of Thranduil on the elk.

At Thranduil’s cue, the elk tossed its antlers and turned towards the wood, walking with stately and measured steps. Showmanship came naturally to it, apparently. The elves and their horses fell in line behind it. Thorin closed his eyes for a moment as they left the dwarf camp completely.

“You are braver than I have given you credit for,” Thranduil said, his voice low enough that only Thorin would catch it.

“I am smarter than you’ve given me credit for, bravery has nothing to do with it,” Thorin said. “You would not have come here unless you had some insurance against being betrayed.”

“Yes,” Thranduil said, and Thorin could _hear_ his smirk, “you are smarter than I have given you credit for.”

Thorin said nothing, forcing himself to keep his eyes towards the woods. If he looked back, he was worried he would run. So he looked at the forest instead, at the pale and twisting shapes of the trees, and tried to think of nothing at all. The mist still clung heavily to the forest, obscuring everything but the trees nearest to the field. It was not a welcoming sight, but nothing in the forest ever would be.

Thorin had prepared himself for a long and nerve-wracking trip back to the palace full of strange sounds whose sources could not be heard through the clinging mist. Instead, the mist disappeared entirely the moment the elf at the rear of the procession was in the forest. Thorin sat up, startled, and turned to look at Thranduil. The Elvenking was completely calm.

A green and gold shape dropped out of the tree beside them, and Thorin would have thrown himself off the side of the elk had Thranduil not grabbed the back his cloak. Thorin realized after a moment that the shape was in fact Legolas, who had been perched in the tree like an owl.

All around them, elves were dropping out of the trees with casual ease. Thorin counted seventy, and there were probably more that he missed. _They have been here the entire time_ , Thorin realized, staring at the full quiver of arrows on Legolas’ back and the knives strapped to his waist. _They were waiting in the mist in case of trouble._ Thranduil had brought a small army to the negotiations without the dwarves having any idea.

“They have no trouble seeing through my illusions, if I will it,” Thranduil told Thorin. “You were wise not to run.”

Legolas asked something in Elvish, and Thorin did not have to speak the language to know what he was asking: _why is the dwarf still with you?_

Thranduil’s tone was distinctly angry when he responded, and whatever he said made Legolas furrow his eyebrows and give Thorin a considering look. Thorin just stared back, not bothering with a glare. What was the point?

The king and his son had a short conversation, which ended with Legolas patting the elk’s side affectionately and calling out an order to his fellow elves. They scrambled back into the trees as nimbly as squirrels.

“No one is following you into these woods, you needn’t bother,” Thorin said, unable to stop himself from glancing back at the field he could still see through the treeline.

“They are returning to the palace,” Thranduil said. “We move more easily through the trees in some parts of the forest.”

Thorin just nodded and leaned back against Thranduil. If the elf was going to insist on riding behind him, then he could damn well serve as a chair. Thorin had no energy left to bristle and snarl at him, not right now.

Their trip back to the palace was made in silence.


	10. Chapter 10

Thorin spent the journey quiet and expressionless. Every emotion that welled in him was suppressed, whether it was the heat of anger or the emptiness of sorrow. Halfway through the forest, Thorin stopped leaning on Thranduil and instead sat up, straight-backed and rigid. It was easier to keep himself under control if he was not touching anyone.

It was a trick he’d learned from his Father, long before Erebor fell. Thorin had been young, barely older than Dis was at present, and standing before his grandfather’s court had filled him with shuddering fear. He had been unused to so many eyes on him at once and felt crushed beneath the weight of disdainful glances and cutting whispers. He’d confessed his fear to his father, since he had believed there was nothing his father could not fix.

“I feel very nervous before the court too, sometimes,” Thrain had said, pulling Thorin up onto his knee. “When I am up there and feel like I might bolt, I pretend that I am Erebor.”

“Erebor?” Thorin had asked, puzzled.

Thrain had nodded. “The mountain endures cold and heat without effort, lets the wind lash it and the rain carve it. It knows that it will be there long after its enemies have exhausted themselves against it. It is stone, and stone does not fear. I pretend I am the mountain, and it gives me strength.”

Now, astride a giant elk and still prisoner of a fey and sometimes cruel elf, Thorin closed his eyes and pictured Erebor. Even wrecked and abandoned, its insides hollowed out and dead, it still stood strong. Thorin could be strong as well.

He stayed silent and blank as a weathered rock face as they returned to the palace. Thranduil answered a barrage of questions from various courtiers in that quick Elvish tongue and Thorin simply stood beside him, staring into the middle distance. It was not safe to let go of his memories of stone and stability, not yet. Thranduil had to tug on his shoulder when he finally led Thorin back into his quarters. Thorin simply followed, letting Thranduil guide him all the way back to the Elvenking’s bedroom. Night had begun to fall, Thorin realized, staring dazedly out the glass windows at the bright red sunset.

“Thorin,” Thranduil said, and it was neither a question nor a statement. It occurred to Thorin that Thranduil probably didn’t have a damned clue what to do either, and he nearly laughed.

Instead, he looked up at Thranduil and asked, “What’s wrong with him?”

Thranduil furrowed his eyebrows and did not answer.

“What’s wrong with him?” Thorin asked again, letting his emotions flood back in. Anger and fear and frustration tangled in his chest, and his voice was a growl as he added, “You elves like to say you’re the wisest and fairest and most delightful of all the creatures on Arda. I am hoping you are at least wise. Tell me what’s befallen my grandfather, and do not lie.”

Thranduil stared at him, his expression tense but otherwise unreadable. _He’s going to say no_ , Thorin thought, and wasn’t sure whether he wanted to rage or start crying.

But Thranduil sighed suddenly, the smallest exhalation of breath, and nodded. “Yes. Very well. Wait here for a moment.”

For once, Thorin was inclined to obey, and so he leaned against the wall and watched as Thranduil set about shedding his robes of state. The elaborately embroidered traveling cloak was tossed onto the bed, and Thranduil disappeared into what must have been a wardrobe soon after. Thorin contemplated following him out of curiosity, but decided against it. Seeing an entire room of silks and fine linens would only depress him further at the moment.

When Thranduil emerged, he was wearing only a long, silvery tunic and green leggings. His crown had been removed, his feet were bare, and only the large moonstone ring remained on his finger. It was the most underdressed Thorin had ever seen him, and some distant part of him was almost amused. Even elves craved simplicity and freedom after a long day in formalwear, it seemed.

“Come with me,” Thranduil said, not sparing Thorin a glance as he strode past him and out the door. He led them down the hall and into the small library that Thorin had spent so much time in. Thorin wondered what Thranduil could possibly mean to show him here, since there was little in the room that Thorin had not picked over at least once.

Thranduil opened a small cabinet that, to Thorin’s recollection, held spare ink and quills along with a myriad of other supplies useful in a library. He withdrew a small bag and placed it on the table before turning to the highest shelves of the library in search of a book. Thorin hadn’t bothered with the high shelves; he had no way to get to them except by literally climbing the bookcase, and every book appeared to be in Elvish anyway.

Thranduil plucked a heavy volume off the shelf, and Thorin saw that the edges of the pages were gilded. Even in the modest light of the library, they shimmered gold. He narrowed his eyes. To his knowledge, dwarves were the only race that decorated their books in such a manner. He became more confused and far more suspicious when Thranduil flipped open the book and Thorin could glimpse Khuzdul runes. He crossed his arms tightly and tamped down the urge to yank the book out of Thranduil’s hands. Khuzdul was secret and sacred. It did not belong in an elf’s possession, whether that elf could read it or not.

Thranduil flipped to the middle of the book and carefully unfolded a long chart. It took up the length of the table, and Thorin had to climb onto a chair to see it fully. It was a family tree, that much was obvious. It was only as he leaned closer that he realized-

“This is _my_ family.”

“All the way back to Durin the Deathless, assuming it is accurate.”

It was accurate, although Thorin would not be sharing that with Thranduil. He reached out to gently trace his finger along the lines of his heritage. Each name was written in both Khuzdul and Elvish, the ink dark and heavy on the paper. At the base of the tree was Durin, memorialized with a small yet exquisitely detailed portrait. Thorin let his finger rest on his grandfather’s name at the edge of the page.

“It is incomplete.”

“It was not when the book was given to me,” Thranduil said, leaning a hip against the table and leaning over Thorin. “Your grandfather and his brother Fror were but children, and their brother Gror had not yet been born.”

“Why do you have this?” Thorin asked, looking up at him. “ _How_ did you come to you have this?”

“Believe it or not, dwarves have sometimes tried to curry favor with me,” Thranduil said wryly. “This book is a history of Elvish and Dwarvish relations.”

“They tried to curry favor with you by giving you a history of why our races hate one another?” Thorin asked skeptically. 

“I was expanding the caves at the time, and I suppose they wanted to remind me of the wonders of Doriath,” Thranduil explained. “The illustrations in that chapter are quite lovely. Although the pictures curiously disappear when the dwarves begin slaughtering the city.”

“We prefer to memorialize our wanton slaughtering with stonework.” Thorin was in no mood to be berated for events that had happened centuries before his birth. “Why are you showing me this?”

Thranduil picked up the small bag and dipped a hand inside. He emerged with a handful of small amethyst crystals that were flattened on one side so that they would stand upright on their own. Map markers, most likely. “Place one on every member of your family who has died in battle.”

Thorin simply glared at him, and Thranduil gave a frustrated huff of breath. “I am not searching for hidden knowledge, dwarf. I do not _care_ about your family secrets. I am illustrating a point, nothing more, and it will progress faster if you will help.”

Glancing at the chart, Thorin conceded the point. His family’s history was a matter of public knowledge even among other races, and it seemed unlikely that Thranduil would gain some tactical advantage from knowing for certain how Thorin’s great-great-great-aunt had died.

And so he began placing markers one after the other across the paper like glittering purple gravestones. Melancholy descended on him as he worked. So many lives had been cut short, regardless of whether the battles had been won or lost. There was Durin VI and his son Nain, slain in the caverns of Khazad-dûm by Durin’s Bane. There was Faron, gutted by elves in the Battle of the Thousand Caves. There was Thorin’s great-grandfather, Dain, killed in his own halls by a Cold-drake.

Thorin sat back with a sigh once his work was finished. A sizeable minority of the family tree now bore amethyst markers. He glanced up at Thranduil. “Dwarves die in battle often. I hope that’s not the knowledge you were planning to impart.”

“Not quite,” Thranduil said, reaching into the bag again. He leaned over Thorin’s shoulder to study the paper. After a moment of consideration, he began placing markers of his own.

Thorin watched, puzzled as to the significance of the second markers. Many of them were placed next to kings who had been killed in battle, but plenty were also placed on dwarves who had died without ever coming close to the throne. By the time Thranduil had finished, he had placed a second amethyst crystal next to one out of four of Thorin’s markers. With that complete, he took a seat across from Thorin and asked, “What do you know of gold-sickness?”

Thorin laughed. He couldn’t help himself, after the terrible day he’d experienced. _This_ was what Thranduil meant to tell him? Some mix of old crones’ tales and xenophobia?

“It is no laughing matter,” Thranduil said, irritation heavy in his voice.

“No, I’m sure it’s quite a specter to those who believe in it.” Thorin brought himself under control, but it was a struggle. His emotions were raw after so much turmoil, and his control was a fraying string.

“Dwarves do not believe in gold-sickness?” Thranduil asked, tilting his head like a curious bird.

“Let me tell you what dwarves know of gold-sickness,” Thorin said, flattening his hands on the tabletop and leaning forward. “When we asked to be paid fairly for the work we do, it is called gold-sickness. When we toil and struggle in the mines and are proud of what we produce, it is called gold-sickness. When we want the security that wealth brings, it is called gold-sickness. ‘Gold-sickness’ is how other races spit on the dwarves for being what we are and for demanding to be treated as equals! They see insanity where there is none so they can call us senseless and mad!”

He was shouting by the end, his nails digging into the wood of the table like knives. How dare Thranduil respond to Thorin’s fears with some fictional malady? So much for the wisdom of the elves.

Thranduil was silent for a moment, his expression inscrutable, before he said, “Let me tell you what the elves know of gold-sickness. We know that the dwarves are greedy. We know they are stubborn to the point of senselessness and their grudges will never fade. We know they are full of lust, but not for flesh. They lust for battle and for gold and for blood. We know they care nothing for the rest of the world and cannot be trusted to deal fairly with other races-”

“ _You piece of shit,_ ” Thorin snarled in Khuzdul, “ _I will not sit here and listen as you-”_

“-But we know they love their families with a fierceness that is commendable,” Thranduil finished, his gaze even and calm in the face of Thorin’s fury. “We know that a dwarf would rather suffer the most grievous wounds imaginable if the alternative is that his parents or children would suffer it. We know that their loyalty, once earned, is nigh impossible to corrupt. We know that they love and treasure that love above all the riches in the world. They are strange and foreign and nothing like us, but they do love.”

Thorin stared at him, his anger slipping away like water through his fingers. He let his fists unclench and sat back carefully. Thranduil was going somewhere with his speech and Thorin would allow himself to be led, even if he knew with a terrible, leaden certainty that he would not like what he discovered. He nodded, just once, for Thranduil to continue.

“When dwarves turn on their kin, it is cause for notice and alarm,” Thranduil said, looking down at the family tree laid out across the table. “I have watched your family, Thorin, ever since the fall of Moira led the first Thrain to the Lonely Mountain. I have conferred with others of my race. Dwarves are secretive, but we have gleaned certain patterns that appear again and again in your line.”

“Patterns?” Thorin asked. A lump was rapidly forming in his throat.

“Hoarding, for lack of a better term, is often one of the first signs,” Thranduil explained, letting his gaze fall to the table rather than Thorin’s face. “Wealth is neither invested nor spent, it is simply…kept. Of course, kings must accumulate wealth for the good of their people, and so it can be difficult to distinguish what is normal and what is not, but there seems to be a clear tipping point.”

Thorin remembered his grandfather in Erebor’s treasury, jaw slack and eyes glassy as he stared at the wealth around him. He remembered the tight, frightened feeling in his gut that he had never been able to articulate.

“A refusal to turn back in the face of clear danger is another bad omen. That is why I have marked Durin VI and Nain,” Thranduil said, nodding at the markers on the chart. “The _creature_ they awakened would have left signs behind as it burrowed down to its place of slumber. It is impossible to believe that the dwarves of Moira did not find these signs. But they were ordered to keep digging.”

“Khazad-dûm had the richest veins of mithril in all the world,” Thorin argued. “Anyone would have kept digging.”

“Perhaps.” Thranduil lifted his shoulder in a shrug. “Only the dwarves who were there could know for sure. Gold-sickness can be hard to prove, as with many illnesses of the mind. There are no fevers or rashes to show its presence.”

“Do not,” Thorin’s fingers curled into claws, “give me a sanctimonious lecture about being sick in the head, or I will bash your face in with this book.”

Thranduil just looked at him, something dangerously like pity on his face (and stoking Thorin’s agitation that much higher) before he said, “The most reliable sign of gold-sickness is an apathy towards family. Nothing matters besides riches, and if a sick dwarf must trade a family member for the chance to have more, then he will.”

What could Thorin say to that? What could he say at all? His chest was a forge, emotions heaving and burning inside, constantly shaping themselves into something new. Anger, disbelief, sorrow, denial, all of them roiling inside of him. He felt dizzy, as if he had been drugged once again.

“I remember when you were born,” Thranduil said, and Thorin could actually _hear_ pity in his voice. He gritted his teeth, but Thranduil continued, “Your grandfather hosted a celebration the likes of which had not been seen since the birth of your own father. Thror was always avaricious, but he was never cruel. And he loved you.”

‘Loved’, past tense. Thorin felt like his bones were vibrating, and he realized that he was shaking. It was all too much. This day, the week preceding it, every day since Erebor fell. It was all too much. He looked away from Thranduil and down at his family tree instead. The point Thranduil had been trying to illustrate clicked suddenly in his mind, like a match being struck. “Everyone you’ve placed a marker on…you suspect they were ill in the same way my grandfather is?”

Thranduil nodded.

Thorin stared down at the paper bleakly. So many. Mahal’s mercy, there were so many. His eyebrows furrowed. “Why only the ones who died in battle?”

If he had looked up a mere second later, he would have missed the way Thranduil’s eyes darted nervously to the side. If he had never seen that, perhaps he would have had no reason to be suspicious. Perhaps things would have been different.

“Families who have the means likely hide their ill loved ones,” Thranduil said, his expression placid once more. “It is easiest for outsiders to see the effects on dwarves who are too powerful to be shut away.”

It was a logical answer, and Thorin might have accepted it if not for that lone, nervous flicker of Thranduil’s eyes. “And what more?”

Thranduil looked at him, eyes narrowing. “There is nothing more. You asked what malady has befallen your grandfather, and I have answered.”

“You are lying,” and something in Thranduil’s expression told Thorin that he wasn’t wrong. “What. More?”

Thranduil’s expression was somewhere between anger and sorrow as he asked, “How do dwarves depose their kings?”

“Dwarves do not depose their kings,” Thorin sneered. “We are not fickle and shiftless like Men.” Strictly speaking, that was not entirely true. There was a process, but it was secret, and it required the king in question to be somewhat open to hearing reason. If what Thranduil was saying was the truth, none of the kings he had marked would have been reasonable by the end.

“And you frown on regicide as well.” Thranduil’s questions were not truly questions. Thorin knew that he was simply strengthening the evidence for whatever awful thing he planned to tell Thorin next, and some part of him that may have been wise or simply cowardly begged to stop now.

Thorin did not stop. “Of course we do.” The last dwarf convicted of regicide had seen his entire family executed before he himself was boiled alive. That had been during the Second Age. No dwarf had tried to kill their king since.

Thranduil folded his hands on the table, moonstone ring glinting. “Then how might one go about removing their king from leadership, if he cannot be deposed and he cannot be killed outright?”

Thorin opened his mouth to say that he had no idea. Unlike elves, _he_ didn’t spend his time plotting the best way to kill dwarves. But then he looked down at his family tree and the amethyst markers, and suddenly Thorin understood exactly what Thranduil was implying.

“How dare you,” he murmured, finding it hard to speak past the lump in his throat.

“It is an easy thing, to lose track of someone in a battle,” Thranduil said. The worst part was that he was not taunting Thorin; his voice was _sympathetic_. “Easier still to say that there was nothing you could have done to stop a death when it came at the hands of the enemy. No one would pass blame, and no one would be beholden to the whims of a mad king any longer.”

“Be silent,” Thorin whispered. He could not breathe, his thoughts skittering like marbles across glass.

“I do not think all the dwarves I have marked were killed in this way, but I have watched this pattern repeat itself in your family for a thousand years,” Thranduil said. He reached out and tapped a finger on Durin VI’s name. “I became sure when word of Moria’s fall reached my ears. The royal family always has access to the best and most secure escape routes. Durin and his son turned away from escape to go deeper into the mines, and no one stopped them.”

When Thorin closed his eyes, he saw Thror reaching up for the Arkenstone with no thought to anything else. He remembered the way his grandfather had tried to run after the jewel when he had lost his grip on it. Thror would have chased it straight into Smaug’s mouth if Thorin had not been there to pull him out of the mountain.

He was going to be sick.

“You are upset,” Thranduil sighed. “It is but my own theory, and I do not have proof. And if you had not been so stubborn, I would not have told you at all.”

Thorin barely heard him. He pushed away from the table, stumbling out of the chair. The urge to _run_ pounded through him, and with it came the cutting despair of knowing he had nowhere to go. His grandfather might well order him shipped back to Thranduil even if Thorin made it through the forest.

His grandfather. His grandfather who fought wildly, madly, with little concern for his own safety. The King’s Guard had kept him safe in the few skirmishes they had encountered since leaving Erebor, but…but in a large enough battle, they would be distracted. They would rely on Thror’s family to help keep him safe. It would be easy to step to the side, to feign ignorance while some enemy slipped past…

It would be so easy.

Thorin ran blindly, barely realizing that he was moving at all. He was too upset to do anything besides run, and so run he did, heedless of Thranduil calling his name. Thorin did not try to escape out into the palace proper; the thought of more eyes on him (eyes that would surely know the terrible thoughts pounding inside his skull) made the bile rise in his throat. He needed desperately to be alone, even if only for a moment. A moment was all he needed, to scrub the filthy idea out of his mind before it took root.

He slammed a door behind him, locked it firmly, and only then realized that he had locked himself inside Thranduil’s bedroom. Under other circumstances, he would have laughed. Instead, he sank down onto his knees next to the windows, staring out at the forest without seeing it at all.

Thorin loved his grandfather. He loved him fiercely and adoringly. There was another way. Thorin was not a monster.

The idea repeated itself nonetheless, a thousand poisonous variations, until Thorin wanted to slam his head against the stone walls. He did not move, though. Not even when Thranduil began pounding on the door so hard that it shook in its frame.

“Thorin! Thorin, open this door at once! Do you hear me? Thorin!”

He did not move.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thus marking the Second Worst Day So Far of Thorin not-yet-Oakenshield's life.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> New chapter! Also, I have a writing Tumblr if any of you are interested in following. It is mostly reblogged fic-spiration graphics, a.k.a. Thorin and Thranduil creeping on each other. Link: http://shinynewwriting.tumblr.com/

The pounding stopped after a few moments, leaving Thorin hopeful that Thranduil had gone away. With the Elvenking gone, Thorin could find a way to grapple with his terrible, traitorous thoughts. He dug his fingernails into his palms until they came away bloody.

Then the bedroom door practically exploded off the hinges, coming to rest a few feet from Thorin with a massive thud. Thranduil stood on the other side, dusting off his hands with a look of unmasked irritation. Thorin stared wide-eyed, his gaze darting between Thranduil and the door in confusion. That door had been solid and made to endure, like everything in Thranduil’s kingdom.

“How did you do that?” 

“I would not have done it at all if I had known you were simply sitting on the floor and staring at nothing,” Thranduil snapped, striding over to Thorin to glare down at him.

“What else would I be doing?” Thorin asked indignantly.

“Slitting your own throat or some other manner of mad self-destruction.” 

Thorin glared at him. “I am not going to hurt myself, you idiot.” 

He was not actually entirely sure of that. He wasn’t going to kill himself, of course. He had dwarves depending on him. But his body was practically vibrating with restless, upset energy and he desperately wanted to purge it all.

Thranduil raised an eyebrow, calling Thorin a liar without ever speaking, and sat down beside him. It was strange to see the Elvenking sitting on the floor, long legs folded neatly underneath him and the tips of his hair brushing against the floor.

Thorin glanced away and said, “Why pretend as if you care what happens to me? If I died, it would be one less problem for you.”

“If you died, there would be no power on the earth, sky, or sea that would stop your family from making war on me,” Thranduil said. “Perhaps it would even get through to your grandfather, though I think his righteous fury would soon be distracted by the emeralds in the royal vault.”

Thorin clenched his jaw, still not looking at Thranduil. “If you told me those things because you hope I’ll be your puppet, your…your assassin, then you can-”

Thranduil grabbed Thorin’s chin suddenly, forcing him to turn and face the elf. That fey, dangerous light shone in his eyes again, hinting at violence and ancient anger. Leaning close, Thranduil murmured, “The sooner that you understand that not everything revolves around you, Thorin, the sooner life will begin making sense.” Then Thranduil visibly brought himself under control, his grip loosening on Thorin’s chin. “I told you about your family because you asked. If you don’t wish to know the truth, do not ask. A simple solution.”

Normally, such condescending advice would have sparked Thorin’s rage. But he was distracted by Thranduil’s fingers on his chin, by the touch that would have been called a caress in any other circumstances. A dozen realizations clicked into place, and Thorin tilted his head. “You were not planning to bed me just to humiliate me.”

Thranduil blinked, clearly baffled by the sudden change of topic, and then yanked his fingers back as if Thorin’s skin was burning him. With an irate sigh, he shook his head. “Your ability to focus on the most inconsequential of things is truly amazing.”

“It’s true,” Thorin said, rising up onto his heels in amazement. All this time, he had assumed that Thranduil had chosen these terms to hurt him, that the thrill the Elvenking received came only from subduing and mastering his enemy so completely. The idea that Thranduil might _want_ him, even if only on purely physical terms, had honestly never occurred to Thorin. 

For the first time in a very long time, Thorin felt like he had some kind of power over his situation.

“I told you as we were negotiating that you were not unattractive, for a dwarf,” Thranduil said, his tone somewhere between wary and bemused. “Do you think I am in the habit of handing out idle flatteries for no reason at all?”

“Do the other elves know how perverse you are?” Thorin asked, his grin savage. He felt volcanic, burning and explosive. He wanted to scrape himself raw, or scrape someone else rawer. “Lusting after dwarves-”

“You are just barely out of childhood,” Thranduil sneered, “so it is no shock that you honestly believe that the races of Arda all keep to themselves. And I suppose that your venerable grandfather wouldn’t want you to know that the dwarves have used more than gold to curry favor.”

Thorin lunged at Thranduil, hands stretched into claws and a curse on his lips. He wasn’t even surprised when Thranduil grabbed him easily and slammed him to the ground. The air left Thorin’s lungs in a painful hiss, and something inside of him cried out in delight. Pain, sensation, all of it pulled Thorin’s mind away from his dark and awful thoughts. He clawed at Thranduil, wanting to feel blood under his fingernails again.

Thranduil seemed oblivious to Thorin’s nails digging furrows into his arm, or perhaps the pain was minimal enough to be ignored. He grabbed Thorin by the shoulders and shook him. “I have been kind to you, kinder than I needed to be-”

“Then stop!” Thorin snarled. He was out of control, his momentum carrying him forward when common sense screamed at him to stop. “Stop with your _kindness_ and just take what you want!”

The kiss didn’t take him by surprise, not this time. The force of it knocked Thorin’s head back against the stone floor, and he fisted his hands in Thranduil’s hair, demanding more. He wanted more pressure, more pain. He wanted this to hurt.

Thorin had trouble tracking what happened in the blur that followed. Thranduil’s fingers were long and deft, undoing the buckles and laces of Thorin’s clothing with ease. Thranduil’s skin was hot, like he had been sprawled in a patch of sunlight just seconds ago. Thranduil’s mouth was sharp, leaving a trail of bitemarks and bruises across Thorin’s skin.

Thorin could finally admit (even if only to himself) that Thranduil was beautiful. Not in the way that dwarves were beautiful, but in an alien way that sent Thorin’s blood racing all the same. Thranduil’s body was pale and hairless; he was a creature of soft angles and long limbs, and oh, Thorin _wanted_.

That want carried him backwards towards the bed, thoughtless and desperate as he wrapped Thranduil’s long hair around his fingers to yank the elf’s head down for another kiss. Thranduil slipped a leg between his thighs and Thorin’s hips bucked helplessly. He reached down to stroke his knuckles along Thranduil’s half-hard cock (as pale as the rest of him, longer and slenderer than Thorin’s own) and laughed breathlessly when the Elvenking growled.

“Do it,” he hissed, “do it now, I want-”

He wanted to be ripped open, scraped out and remade. He wanted pain, to see his emotions made manifest and carved into his skin. He wanted Thranduil to destroy him.

He nearly objected when Thranduil reached for a bottle of oil in the drawer of a bedside table. But then Thranduil bit down on the junction where his neck met his shoulder and Thorin was left moaning, speechless. He could feel his cock pulsing with every pounding beat of his heart. 

“All you ever do is fight,” Thranduil murmured, turning him on his side and curling up behind him. The position made it easy to use his knee to push Thorin’s leg up, and easier still to reach down and drag his thumb along the head of Thorin’s cock. “Even now, you are driven by lust for blood. Your own, I think.”

Thorin arched back against him, making sure to grind against Thranduil’s hardness. “I think I told you to stop pretending as if you care what happens to me.”

Thranduil laughed, and slid his free hand along Thorin’s thighs, leaving the skin glistening with oil. Thorin waited for his hand to reach higher, to reach into him. He waited for violence and blood.

He did not get it. Instead, Thranduil pushed his leg down so that Thorin’s thighs were pressed together, slinging his own leg over Thorin’s to keep him in place. Thorin felt the weight of Thranduil’s cock brushing against the backs of his legs, felt Thranduil shudder as he pushed his cock forward between Thorin’s thighs.

Thorin was nearly gnashing his teeth as he growled, “Damn you, I want-”

“I know what you want,” Thranduil said, his hips moving steadily as he thrust into the slick, hot pressure between Thorin’s thighs. His hand had never left Thorin’s cock, and he began stroking in time with his movements. “You want pain, and it will give you a new reason to hate me come morning.”  
He twisted his hand in a particularly interesting way, and Thorin moaned despite himself. He tensed his thighs, hoping to make the pressure too much to be pleasurable, but it backfired badly as Thranduil gasped behind him and thrust that much faster.

“This is not about what you want,” Thranduil murmured, teeth tugging on Thorin’s earlobe. “It has never been about what you want.”

“I hate you,” Thorin growled, his back bowing as he thrust up into Thranduil’s hand. He could feel Thranduil’s cock rubbing against his stones, the friction perfect and awful. “ _I hate you!_ ”

“I know,” Thranduil murmured, wrapping his leg that much tighter around Thorin’s. His movements were becoming quicker, jerkier. “Spill for me, little prince.”

 _“Fuck you and your ancestors and every_ -ah!” And then Thorin was coming, a night full of tension and fury spilling out of him like blood from an open wound. He bit through his own lip to keep from making any further noises, but his traitorous body still jerked and twitched like a fish on a hook.

When he was finally still, his body shaking slight from the aftermath, Thorin finally felt the exhaustion he had been fighting for an entire day (an entire month, an entire year) wrapping itself around him. Its arms were tighter than even Thranduil’s, and Thorin slumped back against the elf. He let his eyes fall closed and felt Thranduil moving between his thighs, faster and faster. The sudden, hot spill of seed inside and across his thighs was barely enough to make him stir, and he just sighed. 

Thorin half-expected to be kicked off the bed, but Thranduil just repositioned himself and pulled Thorin’s back against his chest. Exhausted, warm, and feeling thoroughly battered, Thorin stopped fighting and let sleep rise up to claim him.

***

Thorin awoke with a start, disoriented and confused. He was in Thranduil’s bedroom, in the Elvenking’s bed, with said Elvenking draped against his back-

Ah. Well.

Thorin slipped out of Thranduil’s grasp as carefully as he could. Naturally, the elf didn’t snore or give any other surefire indication that he was still asleep, but he wasn’t talking or mocking Thorin either. Thorin was willing to take a gamble if it meant he might successfully get back to his cell before Thranduil woke. Whatever the Elvenking had to say about last night, Thorin did not want to hear it. He wanted to sit quietly, speak to no one, and drink until he passed out.

At least his thoughts weren’t as churning and sharp-edged as they had been last night. The urge to claw off his own skin was gone, and for that, Thorin was thankful.

He located his shirt, trousers, and underclothes easily enough. His boots were nowhere to be seen, though. Perhaps they’d been kicked under the bed? Thorin didn’t want to chance waking Thranduil to find out. He would find them later. Much, much later.

Thorin crept from the room, perversely grateful that Thranduil had torn the door off the hinges since it made sneaking easier. He made it down the hall without a peep from the Elvenking and began to feel hopeful. He was halfway through buttoning his shirt when Legolas rounded the corner.

He and the elf stared wide-eyed at each other, both of them frozen in place. Thorin groped for something intelligent to say, something that would be cutting and proud and prevent Legolas from coming to the completely obvious conclusion. What he managed was, “Er. Hello.”

Legolas exploded into movement, shouting in Elvish loudly enough to wake the dead and darting forward. Thorin put his fists up instinctively, but Legolas hadn’t been lunging for him. Instead, he stormed down the hall and into his father’s room, keeping up a steady litany of screaming the entire time.

Thorin stood in the hall, vacillating between following Legolas back into Thranduil’s room or fleeing that wing of the palace completely. In the end, he retreated into the dining room. The thick stone walls meant that he couldn’t hear whatever row was taking place, and that was fine with him.

Through the windows, Thorin could see the sun climbing slowly, chasing away the last dark blue edges of the night. He leaned against the glass and soaked in the first weak but warm rays of sunlight. It was peaceful. _He_ was peaceful, despite whatever chaos Legolas was unleashing down the hall. Saying that he felt good would not be quite accurate, but he at least felt calm, like the sky after a particularly violent and vicious storm. All his rage had been spent, at least for the moment.

A quarter of an hour passed this way before the door to the dining room opened again. Thorin turned to see Thranduil, wrapped in a long, heavy red robe and looking as unruffled as ever. He stared at Thorin evenly, clearly waiting for him to set the tone of whatever would follow.

“So, does your son react this loudly to all of your dalliances, or only the ones with dwarves?” Thorin asked, letting the corners of his mouth curl up a bit.

Thranduil let out a small huff of laughter and something in his posture seemed to relax minutely. He closed the door behind him and joined Thorin by the window.

“He generally prefers not to know of my ‘dalliances’ at all,” Thranduil said, watching the sun slowly illuminate his kingdom. “In this case, his reaction was less because you were a dwarf and more because you are my prisoner.”

 _Oh._ Despite everything, Thorin felt himself warming towards Legolas. Obnoxious Elvish princeling or not, he had shown himself willing to intervene.

“So I take it he was never informed of the original terms of our agreement?” Thorin asked, crossing his arms.

Thranduil did not look away from the sunrise. “Legolas is a kindhearted lad. He cares very much about other creatures, however much he might hide behind a princely façade. He does not have the ruthlessness of a king. With luck, he will never need it.”

“Kindness is not a flaw,” Thorin said, brow furrowing.

“Too much of it is.” Thranduil finally looked down at him. “You will be a king one day. You will learn that if faced with a choice between the good of all and the good of his people, a wise king chooses his people every time.”

Some part of Thorin bristled, his rage over Erebor’s fall never far away. But in the warmth of the morning sunlight, Thorin could see that for all his patronizing, Thranduil was attempting to offer helpful advice. Perhaps even explain himself. Thorin was in no mood to fight.

“It is too early to debate the best style of ruling,” Thorin said, not quite stifling a yawn, “and I find I have no taste for it right now.”

“Are you hungry? Even at this hour, there is probably a cook in the kitchen.”

“I think I’d like to return to my room.” There was more dignity in referring to it as his room rather than his cell. “I could use more rest. It’s been a long…well, a long week.”

Thranduil nodded. “I will have the guards bring you washing water as well.”

“Thank you.” Thorin had been doing his best to ignore the itchy, flaking splashes of seed on his thighs and stomach.

If the guards had any reaction to their king and his barefoot prisoner emerging from the royal suite at an abominably early hour, they hid it well. Thorin was glad for it, because he was fairly sure he would have kneecapped the first guard to say something. Instead, the elves just escorted him down to his cell and brought him a pitcher of warm water, as promised. The only sign that anything was out of the ordinary was that none of the guards seemed willing to meet his eyes.


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A shorter chapter this time, but _Battle of the Five Armies_ has ignited a fire in my soul.

Windowless rooms were, at the very least, fantastic places to get much-needed sleep. The only downside was that Thorin had no idea what time it was when he finally awoke again, but he hardly cared. He felt like himself again, like the blackness inside of him had receded into something manageable, something he could live with. Hopefully it would stay buried.

In the darkness, he stretched and reached up to scratch his chin. When his fingers met stubble, Thorin couldn’t help but grin. _Finally_. He had been barefaced for far too long already. Perhaps some reason and order was finally creeping back into his world. The stubble was more of a shadow on his cheeks than a true beard, but its presence gladdened him. Yawning, he pounded on the door to alert the guards that he was awake.

“Good afternoon, master dwarf,” his guard said, silhouetted in bright sunlight as she opened the door.

Thorin squinted up at her. “Afternoon? Just what time is it?”

“Five hours past noon.”

He’d slept well indeed. Maybe he was making up for all the early mornings and late nights he had weathered since Erebor fell. Glancing at the floor, Thorin’s saw his boots sitting neatly by the door. Apparently the Elvenking had located them after Thorin left.

“Take me to speak with the king,” Thorin ordered the guard, leaning against the wall to tug his left boot on.

When the guard did not respond, Thorin glanced up to find her staring at him skeptically. Calling on his limited store of patience, he added, “He’s going to have me brought before him regardless. You might as well save some underling the trip.”

The guard apparently agreed, because she called down to a companion and the two of them escorted Thorin through the halls of the palace. Instead of guiding him towards the throne or Thranduil’s suite of rooms, they led him upwards, until the winding underground walkways became window-lined hallways flooded with sunlight. Thranduil was outside, then. Thorin was accustomed to the safety of caves and mountain halls; he’d forgotten how much elves craved the sight of the open sky. 

They found Thranduil on a large balcony, the long spill of his hair ruffling gently in the afternoon breeze. As Thorin was led to the stone railing, he saw that below them was a wide, well-maintained training ground. A squadron of soldiers was running through sword drills, dressed lightly in only thin leather armor. Even thirty feet above them, Thorin could smell the good, familiar odors of sword polish and oiled leather.

“Overseeing the troops?” Thorin asked, hefting himself upwards to sit on the railing. He didn’t like having his back to the open sky, but his perch put him eye to eye with Thranduil.

Thranduil waved the guards away, leaving him alone with Thorin on the balcony. If Thranduil felt even the slightest bit unsure following the night’s events, he did not show it, meeting Thorin’s gaze steadily and calmly. “It seems prudent, given how bold the orcs are growing.”

“Hmm.” Thorin scratched at his chin again. “I’d like to renegotiate the terms of my imprisonment.”

The sight of Thranduil’s shoulders stiffening was really its own reward.

“You have nothing to bargain with, besides that which you have already agreed to,” Thranduil said, turning his gaze back to the soldiers below.

“I think I do,” Thorin said cheerfully. “You see, I had not considered that you might actually want my permission or participation when it came time to bed me. And that changes things quite a bit.”

“I see your boldness has come back along with your beard,” Thranduil snapped, “but you are wrong.”

Thorin _laughed_ , delighting in goading him further. “I think, Elvenking, that you are not really as ruthless as you’d like to be.”

Thranduil’s hand shot out, grabbing Thorin by the collar of his shirt and pushing him until he was bent backwards over the balcony railing. Thorin instinctively tightened his knees around the stone, but he knew one good shove from Thranduil would dislodge him and send him toppling to the ground below. Despite all that, he did not flinch.

“Do it, then,” Thorin said, releasing his grip on the railing so that Thranduil’s strength was the only thing keeping him from falling. He didn’t break eye contact with the elf, refusing to back down now that he’d found a gap in Thranduil’s armor.

Thranduil actually snarled, the sound harsh and furious. For a brief second, Thorin wondered if he had badly miscalculated and was about to have his head dashed in on the stone floor of the training room. But Thranduil simply dragged him off the railing and tossed him backwards towards the balcony door. It was enough to send Thorin staggering, but he was fighting back a grin as he regained his footing. He had called the Elvenking’s bluff.

“Elves are not traditionally known for their vicious tempers,” Thorin said, making a show of dusting himself off. “Perhaps you should seek to mend that particular flaw.”

“Perhaps you should scurry out of my sight before I have you gagged and tossed in the dungeons, you miserable little wretch,” Thranduil hissed.

“No. We are negotiating.” Thorin hopped back onto the railing, since he could see how much it irritated Thranduil. “I’m bored, Elvenking. I am not a caged bird content to stare at the wall and sing to myself all day long.”

“You could be a caged dwarf instead and stare at the bars of a cell.”

“True,” Thorin conceded. “Or you could give me free reign of your palace, and in exchange, I promise not to bite.”

Thranduil gave him an utterly withering look. Thorin sighed and added, “I will not try to run. Your forest is vast and I do not trust myself to wander out of it. And I have no place to go even if I do escape.” He bounced the heel of his boot off the stone. “I give my word, I’ll stay put until the month is out.”

Thranduil looked away, staring down at his soldiers. Aside from a marked stiffness in his jaw and his narrowed eyes, there were no outward signs of his anger. Even that tension faded after a moment. Then Thranduil turned to him, and the small smile on his lips seemed like cause for alarm.

“It occurs to me, princeling, that you are not truly offering me anything in this bargain.” Thranduil leaned forward, wrapping one of Thorin’s thinner braids around his fingers. “As I told you days ago, I had no plans to ravage you and leave you for dead. Instead, I simply wished to-” he yanked the braid sharply, forcing Thorin’s head back, “-bend you to my will.”

Thorin grabbed for Thranduil’s wrist, digging his nails into the skin. At times like these, he wished desperately that he had Balin’s skill at negotiation. But he’d gotten himself into this, and he’d get himself out. “Bend all you like, then. It’s no reason to keep me caged in your rooms.”

Thranduil stared down at him, his eyes sharp and considering. “I want more than your word that you will not run. I want your obedience.”

“I’m already being obedient by not biting your damned nose off,” Thorin protested. His neck was starting to ache from the angle it was forced into.

“Then give me more than that.” Thranduil was smirking, curse him, smug and predatory. “Give me a vow of unquestioning obedience. Give me something of value.”

Thorin bit down on the inside of his cheek, considering the terms. They were distasteful, there was no denying that. It was one thing to cooperate with Thranduil for his own self-preservation, but to jump at his commands…it was dangerous. Thranduil could ask anything of him, and Thorin would not dishonor his word by breaking it.

But he had seen many times that Thranduil would not do him real physical harm, not even if he begged for it in the throes of madness. For all that the Elvenking was mercurial and half-mad, Thorin would not be in mortal danger. He had already been able manipulate Thranduil in small ways throughout his stay in Mirkwood; perhaps this would just give him more practice.

And the idea of being able to roam freely was desperately tempting.

“You cannot order me to give you the secrets of my people,” Thorin said, locking eyes with the elf above him. After a moment of thought, he added, “Or to shave my beard.”

Thranduil laughed, though it had a mocking edge. “I have no interest in your secrets. And very well. Your beard is safe.”

Thorin swallowed. “Then I give you my word that in exchange for having the run of your palace, I will-” he grimaced. “-I will be obedient to you until the month is over.”

“I accept.” Thranduil’s already low voice was a purr. He released his hold on Thorin’s hair and stepped back. “Get off of the railing.”

Rolling his eyes, Thorin hopped off of the stone and stood before Thranduil. He let his expression speak for how little he cared for Thranduil’s power plays.

But Thranduil was not done. “Kneel.”

Thorin snarled and did not move.

“Does your word truly mean so little?” Thranduil asked, drifting closer until Thorin had to look almost directly up in order to see his face. “Such a shame, to see the line of Durin so dishonored.”

That nearly earned the Elvenking a broken kneecap. But no, no, this was simply Thranduil trying to punish Thorin, to show his temporary mastery. Thorin could survive this. He had agreed to it, after all. 

So with great reluctance, Thorin lowered himself to his knees before Thranduil. He had knelt perhaps four times in his life, but it had been of his own free will during ceremonies of great importance and reverence. He felt neither reverent or important now, with smooth stone digging into his knees and the Elvenking’s boots so close that he could see the leaf patterns embossed upon them. For a terrifying moment, he wondered if Thranduil would order him to kiss his boots.

But it seemed that Thorin’s reluctant show of obeisance was enough, because after a moment he felt Thranduil’s fingers on his chin, pulling his gaze upward.

“Obedience suits you well, Thorin,” Thranduil said. There was a heat in his eyes that was almost frightening, and despite himself Thorin felt his blood grow a little hotter in response.

Thranduil turned away abruptly, resuming his position by the railing. When he spoke, his voice was as calm and cool as ever, as if he had not been gazing ravenously at Thorin just seconds ago. “Go now and amuse yourself. I will give word to the guards that you are to be allowed to roam the palace.”

Thorin did not need to be told twice, nearly sprinting off the balcony. It felt like he had the world before him now, and he did not want to dwell on the fire in Thranduil’s eyes.


	13. Chapter 13

He had become a familiar fixture in the training yards in the past three days, familiar enough that the elves were drilling elsewhere now. Good. Thorin preferred having the whole place to himself.

The Elvish bows and broadswords were not worth training with. He could lift them easily enough, but their size made them too unwieldy. The shortswords and falchions showed more promise, and Thorin had devoted much of his free time to practicing with them. It was glorious to be able to train again, to feel his muscles move in their old, familiar patterns as his blade cut through the air. It was like finally stretching after being hunched over for hours. Thus far, he had no regrets about promising his obedience if it gained him freedom and a sword in his hand.

Of course, part of that was because Thranduil was toying with him rather than going in for the kill. That had become obvious as three nights had passed with Thranduil sending him off to his rooms after dinner rather than…rather than doing whatever it was the Elvenking would eventually do. The only difference between these dinners and the previous week’s was that Thranduil made him kneel at the end of it all, leaving Thorin on his knees until he was fighting not to squirm under the elf’s gaze. But beyond that, Thranduil had not touched him nor given him an order.

Last night, Thorin’s patience had finally broken and he’d said, “You are playing with me.”

Above him, Thranduil had laughed, the sound deep and almost musical. “Of course.”

Thorin had gritted his teeth and glared down at the ground. “ _Stop_.”

Thranduil’s boot had inched forward and upward, until the toe of it was tucked under Thorin’s chin. The pressure had been gentle but firm enough to force Thorin’s gaze upwards. Thranduil’s eyes had been _hungry_ when he’d answered with a simple, “No.” 

Then he had sent Thorin away, true to his word. He was not done playing.

The memories made Thorin miss a step, stumble out of his routine. With an irritated huff of breath, he went back to his starting position and began again. Perhaps he could request training dummies, sacks of straw, anything physical to absorb his blows.

In time, he began to feel the prickly, crawling feeling of being watched. He glanced around him, expecting the Elvenking to be lurking nearby. Instead, he found Legolas leaning against a doorframe, staring as if Thorin was a strange, unknown animal.

“Can I help you, elf?” Thorin asked, after a moment passed without Legolas saying a word.

“My father mentioned you were allowed to roam outside his wing of the palace,” Legolas said, as though that was actually answering Thorin’s question at all. He pushed off from the doorframe and stepped into the training yard. “You’re a warrior, then? When you aren’t…here.”

“I had a sword in my hand when you and your lot ambushed my caravan,” Thorin sneered.

“Many people carry swords, but that doesn’t mean they are warriors,” Legolas said, the ghost of a smirk on his face. “How many battles have you seen?”

Thorin shrugged. “A few dozen, I suppose.” In truth, most of his fighting had been skirmishes against bandits or trolls. He had yet to experience a battle with an army at his back, unless he counted the brief and agonizing sortie against Smaug. But he doubted Legolas was out here to debate verbal semantics.

Something in his answer made Legolas’ brow furrow. “How old are you?”

“Twenty-nine,” Thorin answered, wondering why Legolas cared.

The elf gasped, looking like he might swallow his own tongue. “Truly?!” At Thorin’s confused nod, Legolas grew even more agitated. “But…but you are a child!”

“Excuse me?” Thorin received plenty of doubt and scorn over his youth from Erebor’s surviving elders, he was not about to be mocked for it by some elf.

But a closer look at Legolas revealed an expression of genuine horror rather than any sort of taunt. The color was high in his cheeks and he actually began to pace in short, sharp steps, like a caged animal.

“Are…are you well?” Thorin ventured after a moment. The last thing he needed was the Elvenking’s son having some kind of fit and dropping dead while they were alone in the training yard.

“You are a _child_ ,” Legolas repeated, his distress not abating in the least.

Thorin was at a loss for words until a thought occurred to him. “When do elves reach adulthood? How many years does it take?”

Legolas stopped his frenetic movements, catching Thorin’s meaning. “We are fully grown at fifty, though we are not truly considered mature until we are a century old.”

Thorin blinked, taken aback by just how strange elven life was. A childhood that lasted one hundred years? And it was probably over in a flash, a mere raindrop when compared to the ocean of their eternal life. It was no wonder that the mortal races held them at a distance.

“I am an adult,” Thorin said, his thoughts returning to the matter at hand. “Just barely, but I can hold property and marry and sign contracts the same as any greybeard.” He picked at a loose thread along his sleeve. “In truth, had Erebor not fallen, it would be many decades until I would have been put in charge of anything of importance. I assume your 101-year-olds are not given command of armies. But we are refugees, and my people need leaders.”

Dwarves thought of their early adulthood as a time of learning, when apprentices would begin truly understanding their chosen crafts and warriors would begin honing their skills. It was a period that lasted for many years more than their actual childhoods, since perfection was by nature a long and slow process. Thorin knew that he would have no proper training in statecraft, nor years of study before seeing the battlefield, and he tried not to think on it too much. Compared to the loss of Erebor, was the loss of a traditional education really so terrible? But he still grew melancholy if he let his thoughts drift in that direction.

Legolas had visibly relaxed, his shoulders lowering and his fists unclenching. “So…so you-”

“So your father is not dragging an infant to his bed, no,” Thorin said, mostly for the joy of watching Legolas flinch at the thought. 

“I did not assume he was, until you mentioned your age!” Legolas snapped. “You look the same as any of the other grown dwarves!”

“How many dwarves have you even seen?” Thorin asked skeptically. “Have you ever actually left this forsaken patch of woods?”

“These woods are not forsaken, they contain everything our people need,” Legolas said, haughty as any swan.

“That’s a no, then.”

“I have been outside the woods!” Apparently, the elf had a bit of a temper when provoked. Thorin would have to remember that for future use. “And I have seen your caravans passing near the borders of the forest many times.”

“So much for the famed Elvish powers of observation, then, if you cannot tell the age of a dwarf.”

“Your sister is nearly as tall as you!” Legolas said, not appreciating the tone of this conversation in the least.

“Eh? Height is the least reliable indicator of age. My pony would know that.” It was about mass and weight, things that measured the strength of muscles and the sturdiness of bones. Still, it made Thorin curious. He’d never had any particular interest in the elves, but he had never had much chance to learn about them either. “How do you tell the age of young elves?”

“It can be difficult to tell by sight alone,” Legolas admitted, clearly happy to move the topic away from dwarves and his lack of knowledge. “By our first year, we are walking and talking with proficiency, though not always grace. Our bodies age very slowly, so there is little difference between a yearling and a child of ten. Indeed, men have mistaken elves of who are twenty for seven-year-olds.”

Thorin stared, struck again by how _alien_ the elves were. The dwarves may have been unplanned additions to Arda, but surely they fit into the world better than these strange, undying creatures. What would it be like to simply stop aging, to remain as unchanging as a statue in spite of all the world might heap upon him? Dwarves bore their scars and wrinkles with pride, but the elves had nothing to bear at all. No wonder they all seemed half-mad. Hoping to keep his disquiet a secret, Thorin did his best to sound teasing as he asked, “Well, you aren’t actually a child, are you?”

That was enough to startle a laugh out of Legolas. “No, no I’m not.”

“How old are you?”

Legolas actually smiled. The expression was small and halting, but it was there. “That’s hardly your business, Master Dwarf.”

“Ah, so you are a child, then.” It was easy to keep a lighter tone with Legolas, far easier than it was when he spoke to Thranduil. The Elvenking always brought his temper to a boiling point, without fail. Thorin hefted his sword up over his shoulder. “Well, I shan’t challenge you to a sparring match, in that case.”

Legolas laughed again, although there was mockery mixed in with it now. “You would not survive sparring with me, dwarf.”

Thorin twirled his sword idly. “Only one way to find out. But I understand if you are intimidated.”

Legolas raised an eyebrow. “If you insist.”

He knew that he was not going to win a fight against Legolas, at least not today. The elf was far older than Thorin and skilled enough to venture through that foul, spider-infested forest with little trouble. Perhaps in a few decades, Thorin would be a seasoned enough warrior to pose a credible threat, but for now, he would be entirely content to give Legolas a few sharp knocks on the head.

He was not, however, expecting to find himself disarmed and flat on his back less than a minute into the bout. Thorin blinked up at the vast, cloudless sky, his mind not quite understanding what had just happened. The tip of Legolas’ sword rested against Thorin’s throat.

From above him, he heard Legolas say, “Yes, I’m feeling very intimidated.”

“Beginner’s luck, nothing more,” Thorin grumbled, rolling away from the sword and getting back on his feet. He knelt to pick up his own sword and moved into a defensive stance. “Again.”

Legolas struck almost too fast to see, his movements flowing together like water in a stream, unbroken and unceasing. Five times Thorin went up against him and five times Thorin ended up on his back, his sword halfway across the training yard. 

“Very well, perhaps you aren’t a child after all,” Thorin said with a groan, climbing to his feet once again.

“Your esteem is more valuable than the stars, truly,” Legolas said, but he was smiling again. He looked kinder when he was smiling, less like the fey prince of Mirkwood and more like a creature of flesh and bone. Thorin had noticed that the same was true for Thranduil, on the rare occasions when the Elvenking was smiling out of kindness rather than mockery.

“Again,” Thorin said, bracing himself for another onslaught.

Instead of immediately rushing him, Legolas twirled his sword, circling Thorin like some kind of great cat closing in on its prey. Thorin matched him step for step, unwilling to take his eyes off the elf. He suspected an attempt at distraction when Legolas said, “You are not going to win.”

“Dwarves don’t surrender,” Thorin replied, flashing his teeth at Legolas.

The elf simply shook his head. Then he darted forward, as fast and sure as an eagle striking. But after five rounds of being knocked on his arse, Thorin could finally anticipate Legolas’ movements and brought his sword up in time to counter the blow. The force of it rattled his bones, but he kept his grip on the sword and shoved back. They grappled for a moment, Thorin digging his heels into the hard stone, and Legolas finally took a step back to swing his sword again.

Thorin still ended up on his back, but he was laughing when it happened.

***

Eventually, Legolas had departed, probably bored by tossing Thorin around the training yard. Thorin was fine with that. His muscles were aching by the end of it anyway. But it was a good kind of ache, the kind that came from pushing himself to his limits. He did not like Legolas (and he knew that the prince of Mirkwood did not like him), but he had to admit that sparring had done him quite a bit of good.

And it never hurt to become familiar with how an enemy fought.

It was nearly dinner by the time Thorin returned to the Elvenking’s wing of the palace. A servant was waiting there to tell him that Thranduil would be late. Obviously, dinner was not going to be served until the king was ready for it, and so that left Thorin alone with nothing to do. He considered his old standbys of the library or the music room, and had actually headed down the hallway before he caught the scent of his own sweat.

A bath, then. He probably had time for it, and if he did not, Thranduil could eat without him.

Thorin sighed in relief as he sank down into the steaming hot water of the bathing pool. Being Thranduil’s captive was considerably more comfortable than being a penniless exile, at least in the short term. The thought gave Thorin a guilty twist in his stomach, which he did his best to banish. He had not chosen his captivity and had done his best to escape; he was not a bad person for enjoying the comforts of hot water amidst all the chaos of his life.

He closed his eyes and let the steam whirl around him, his muscles slowly relaxing in the heat. Thorin was unsure how long he soaked, but he soon heard the shuffling whisper of fabric against stone. He opened his eyes to see Thranduil staring down at him, his long red robes trailing behind him. Amidst the steam from the bath, he resembled some kind of pale fire spirit.

“Evening, Elvenking,” Thorin said, not bothering to move. “What kept you?”

“An envoy from Lothlórien,” Thranduil said, looming over Thorin. “Nothing that requires your concern.”

“I have done my best not to make haunted elf forests my concern, and look at where it’s gotten me,” Thorin said, closing his eyes again and settling his head against the rounded curve of the steps. If Thranduil wanted him out of the pool, he could make it an order.

Thorin’s eyes snapped open again when he heard the rustle of clothing. He watched with no little alarm as Thranduil stripped briskly and efficiently, leaving his clothing folded in a small pile by the edge of the water. Thorin quickly swam to the opposite side of the pool. Thranduil was undeterred, stepping into the water with no apparent concern for its heat.

“Out with you,” Thorin growled. “I was in here to relax.”

“As am I,” Thranduil said, smirking. His hair floated around him like seaweed, the long tendrils of it swaying in the gentle eddies of the water. “I find speaking with the Lady Galadriel and her kin to be very taxing.”

“I find speaking with any elf to be taxing, so I’ll take my leave.” Thorin moved to lever himself out of the water.

“Stop.” 

Thorin froze, gritting his teeth.

“Come here.”

Thorin knew before he turned that Thranduil’s smirk had only grown wider. But he had given his word, and it was worth it for the courtyard and the swords and the feel of the sun on his face. So he swam warily over to Thranduil, growing no less wary when the Elvenking grabbed hold of him and tugged him forward. Having no other choice, Thorin straddled Thranduil’s waist. Sitting on his lap, Thorin was nearly eye to eye with the elf, but found he could not look at Thranduil for long without a blush rising in his cheeks. His eyes settled on the swoop of Thranduil’s collarbone instead. 

He wanted to touch it, and hated himself for that.

Fingers grazed along his cheek gently, following the line of his jaw. “Your beard is growing back.”

“And will continue to,” Thorin said, raising his eyes to stare at Thranduil suspiciously. 

Thranduil chuckled. “Yes, yes, your beard is safe from my blade.” He leaned forward and nipped lightly at Thorin’s neck. Thorin instinctively squirmed away, and Thranduil’s hand came up to grip the back of his neck like he was a disobedient pup. 

Trapped that way, Thorin could not hide the way his body reacted. It was not _fair_ , and he wanted to complain, to snarl and kick. But Thranduil’s hand was on his thigh, moving ever closer higher, and all Thorin could do was gasp and stare up at the glimmering reflections on the ceiling.

“I want to hear you,” Thranduil murmured as he wrapped his fingers around Thorin’s cock.

Thorin bit down on his own lip just to spite him.

Thranduil only laughed, nibbling along the edge of Thorin’s ear. If Thorin had not already been sitting, his knees would have gone weak. “Very well, little dwarf. Hold your tongue for now. But a time will come soon when I will take you and you will beg for it.”


	14. Chapter 14

“I don’t want to go into that foul forest,” Thorin said, hoping he did not sound as sullen as he felt. “I have no idea why you do, either.”

“That ‘foul forest’, as you so charmingly call it, is my kingdom,” Thranduil said, not even sparing Thorin a glance as he adjusted his horse’s saddle. Apparently, the elk did not feel like ferrying them about today.

“Very well, I don’t want to go into your foul kingdom. Better?”

“Oh yes. And you are still going.”

Thorin sighed and let his heels knock against the tack box he was sitting on. “I’m not certain I even understand why we’re going. Surely you have someone who can ride out and assess the damage?”

A storm had raged the previous night. Tucked away in his little room, Thorin had been mostly unaware of it. In his half-asleep state, he had dismissed the booming thunder as machines in the mines. It was only upon waking that he had remembered that he wasn’t in Erebor and the Woodland Realm had no mines at all. The lightning and winds had taken down several swathes of trees, and Thranduil was evidently quite concerned about it all.

_Elves._

“I would prefer to see it for myself,” Thranduil said, stepping back to look the horse up and down. He was apparently satisfied with what he saw and glanced at Thorin over his shoulder. “Whining is unbecoming of a prince.”

“At present, I’m a prisoner, not a prince,” Thorin said, giving Thranduil a toothy and insincere smile.

If Thranduil were not a king, he probably would have rolled his eyes. As it was, he simply held out a hand to Thorin. “Come along then, little prisoner.”

With a sigh, Thorin hopped off the tack box and allowed himself to be lifted onto the horse. He’d have preferred to climb up, but he knew horses were less patient with that sort of thing than Thranduil’s precious elk and Thorin did not want to be trampled. Once he was seated, Thranduil swung himself easily up onto the saddle and settled in behind Thorin. 

Outside the palace, the air was sharp and clear, the smell of the rain still lingering faintly in the damp and shadowy places of the forest. The sky was utterly cloudless, and Thorin squinted in the bright sunlight.

“Tell me we are not going into the parts that make me hallucinate,” Thorin said, eyeing the trees with undisguised dislike.

“The enchantments are under my control, you will be unharmed.”

Thorin twisted to look back at Thranduil. “You don’t _send_ the enchantments, do you? You do not control what people see?”

He did not like the idea of Thranduil having that kind of power. He felt a jolt of fear, sudden and choking, at the idea that Thranduil could reach into his mind so easily and twist what his own eyes were telling him.

“Your mind provides the visions,” Thranduil said, reaching up to tap a finger on Thorin’s temple. “My magic merely brings it to light. What did you see?”

 _Shadows everywhere_ , Thorin thought, brow furrowing. _A dead elk with live maggots on its antlers._ But actually telling Thranduil felt too intimate, somehow. So he just shook his head and turned around to stare at the forest around them. It was green and lively, nothing like the dark and eerie place he had wandered into. This bit of Mirkwood could have been any forest in the world. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath out, and vowed to stay silent about the forest. No need to let Thranduil know just how badly it had rattled him.

Thorin relaxed by increments as they moved through the forest, the bright sunlight and warm breeze soothing his nerves. He was still considerably less confident than Thranduil about the general safety of the forest, but the Elvenking was at least armed. Thranduil was quite the warrior, if Thrain’s old stories were to be believed.

The horse travelled easily up a deer trail, picking its way over upraised roots with the ease of a creature who had grown up watching its footing. Thorin thought wistfully of the riding goats raised in Erebor. Those goats had been able to hop from outcrop to outcrop as gracefully as a cat and with just as much precision. Those goats probably would have been better suited to Mirkwood than ponies, especially since the easier roads passed through the spider lairs.

They rode for an hour, staying silent for most of the trip. Occasionally, Thorin glanced back at Thranduil to find his gaze focused sharply on something Thorin could not see. There was no sign of either spiders or orcs, though, and so Thorin did not bother asking what had caught the Elvenking’s attention.

A distant, familiar squawk sounded across the forest and Thorin straightened with a wide grin. “Ravens! I thought you said that the birds had been driven out of the forest.”

“Some still make their homes in the safer regions,” Thranduil said, his voice amused. “The birds of prey and particularly clever species fare well.”

Another call sounded, closer this time. Thorin cupped his hands around his mouth and called back in a pitch-perfect imitation. The distant raven gave an angry caw at suddenly hearing an interloper in its territory, making Thorin laugh.

“Your family used ravens as messengers,” Thranduil said, in a tone that was not quite a question. “I recall Thrain showing me the aviary once.”

“Erebor’s ravens were the smartest and swiftest in the east.” Thorin smiled at the memory of feeding the birds in the outdoor courtyards, watching them hop and flap around him.

“Did they escape when the dragon took the mountain?” 

Thorin stiffened a little, his good mood fading at the mention of Smaug. “Why do you care to ask?”

He felt Thranduil’s chest move as he sighed. “Unnecessary death is a tragedy, whether it is elf, dwarf, man, or beast that dies. I would like to think that the birds were not trapped to starve in their cages.”

Thorin was unsure whether he wanted to grow angrier or let himself be mollified. The sound of raven chatter swayed him towards calm. “We only kept them caged at night, to keep them from being taken by owls. The aviary is a good distance from the treasury, so I’d expect most of them were able to flee through the windows.” Thorin rubbed his thumb across the horse’s fur absentmindedly. “Some of them actually rejoined us. We’ve several riding with the caravan.”

“I would imagine some found a roost in my woods, then,” Thranduil said. “We’ll have to begin hiding the shinier baubles.”

Thorin laughed before he could stop himself. How many times had dwarves complained of something going missing only to find it in a raven’s nest three days later?

Thranduil’s hand brushed against his. “I was beginning to think you’d forgotten how to laugh.”

Thorin rolled his eyes. “Because you are the very image of a cheerful woodland sprite.”

That was enough to startle a matching laugh out of Thranduil, and Thorin smiled despite himself. He always counted it a victory when he could force an unexpected response out of Thranduil.

Before long, they approached the rise where most of the damage had taken place. Even from a distance, Thorin could see the destruction left behind by the storm. A wide swathe of trees had been felled, uprooted by the sheer force of the wind. Some had been ripped completely out of the ground, while others hung at crooked angles, their roots partially dragged from the earth and hanging on desperately. From above, it must have looked like a scar on flesh, a brutal disruption of the flow of the forest.

“Was anyone injured in the storm?” Thorin asked, eyeing a tree that had managed to completely crush a small sapling.

“A family of foxes was lost, as well as several birds,” Thranduil said, sliding out of the saddle to tie the horse’s reins to a nearby branch. Thorin slid off the saddle after him, unwilling to be helped down like a child. “No elves, however, for which I am glad.”

Thorin raised an eyebrow. “How could you possibly know what manner of beast was killed in the storm?”

The look Thranduil gave him was enigmatic, and the Elvenking stared at him for a long moment before nodding at something in the woods at Thorin’s back. “See for yourself.”

Startled, Thorin turned and gasped aloud upon seeing a pure white stag emerge from the trees. It was not as massive as the elk, but it was clearly no normal deer. Two elegant, upswept antlers crowned its head and its fur seemed to actually shine, though whether that was due to its color or some sort of magic, Thorin did not know. The stag appeared to be studying them with intelligence in its wide, dark eyes.

“Some relative of your oversized mount?” Thorin asked, watching curiously as the stag continued approaching them with no caution in its movements.

Thranduil’s lips quirked. “Not quite.”

To Thorin’s surprise, the stag walked right past Thranduil as if he was not even there. Instead, it stood in front of Thorin and bent down to sniff at his hair. Thorin stepped back, nervous to see a wild animal acting so friendly. A moment passed with the stag doing nothing but sniffing him and nosing at his hair, so Thorin carefully raised his hand to touch the creature’s fur. It was surprisingly soft, with no brambles or twigs tangled in it.

The stag raised its head and looked Thorin directly in the eye. He had not been wrong; something more than animal cunning glittered in its gaze. Thorin looked at Thranduil, his questions written clearly on his face.

“This is a construct of mine,” Thranduil said, reaching out to rest a hand on the stag’s sturdy back. 

“A construct?” 

“Created by my magic,” Thranduil explained. “I use it as my eyes and ears in the depths of the forest.”

“So it’s an illusion?” Thorin asked, baffled. The stag seemed solid enough beneath his hand. Its nose was cool and slightly wet as it snuffled his hair and mouthed at the fur of his cloak.

“No, a creature of flesh and blood.” Thranduil smirked, though his eyes were distant. “My blood, in fact. It is no easy task to build life, not even an imitation of life.”

It sounded too fantastic to be true, and Thorin had always been thoroughly skeptical of all mystics and so-called wizards that seemed to plague the land. “You claim you built this creature and can actually see through its eyes?”

“Yes.”

“Turn around.” When Thranduil raised an eyebrow, Thorin repeated, “Turn around. You cannot just go around declaring magical powers and expect that everyone will believe you. I am going to test this.”

Thranduil laughed, and the sound was surprisingly merry and free of mockery. “Very well.” He turned his back on Thorin and took several steps away. “Test away, little prince.”

Thorin looked up at the elk. “How many fingers am I holding up?”

“None. Clever trick.”

Thorin signed the rudest words he knew in _iglishmêk_.

“And now you are making an overly complex hand gesture which I suspect is not complimentary.”

“None of the hand gestures I make at you will ever be complimentary,” Thorin said. But despite his sarcasm, he felt genuinely amazed. Could the elves really create a creature from nothing and see through its eyes? It should not have been possible, and yet the stag was standing before him.

The stag smelt his beard. Thranduil said, “For breakfast, you ate fish, bread, and some kind of fruit.”

“You could have known that by asking any of the servants.”

“True enough. A better test, then.” The deer sniffed at his pockets. “You are carrying something metal. Silverware, I assume.”

Sheepishly, Thorin pulled the butter knife he had stolen a few days ago out of his pocket.

Thranduil turned back around to stare down at Thorin. “There are probably more practical ways to murder me.” 

“I just don’t like going around unarmed,” Thorin snapped. “I wasn’t planning to kill you.”

“And you’ve sharpened it,” Thranduil said with a sigh. 

“Can all elves create constructs like this?” Thorin asked, as much out of curiosity as a desire to change the subject. “Does your son have a slightly smaller deer scampering around the forest?”

“Creating a creature like this is no small task,” Thranduil said, patting the stag’s flank gently. “There are few elves outside of Valinor with the power to do it. Should Legolas take the throne, he will learn how to use the magic of the forest to his advantage.”

“I thought it was all your magic?” Thorin was increasingly suspicious that Thranduil was just tossing out important sounding nonsense to mock him.

“Some places have a deeper magic than others,” Thranduil said. He was not looking at Thorin. Instead, he was staring across his forest at something only he could see. “Old forests. The dark places of the earth. Quiet, still waters.”

Thorin thought of Mirrormere, the sacred lake in which Durin the Deathless had seen his own reflection, complete with a crown of stars above his head, and understood his destiny for the first time. Whatever else Thranduil was wrong about, he was right about the power and danger of still waters.

Thranduil’s attention finally returned to the matter at hand, and when he looked at Thorin again, the Elvenking’s expression was a little less ethereal. “The point of all this is that it would be in your own best interest to stay here while I do my work, instead of wandering away in another ill-planned escape attempt.”

“I gave my word that I would stay put, and I’ve had quite enough of your forest as it is.” Thorin settled cross-legged in a shady spot beneath a tree. “Go finish your elf nonsense.”

The ‘elf nonsense’ involved Thranduil walking from fallen tree to fallen tree with an expression of great concentration, sometimes kneeling down to lay his hands against the bark as if he was feeling for vibrations. After a half hour of it, Thorin was utterly bored. The white stag had disappeared into the trees, robbing Thorin of any potential entertainment there.

He leaned back against the tree and closed his eyes. In the sunlight, with only the sound of birdsong and the wind, Thorin felt downright peaceful. This was pleasant. It reminded him of camping trips along Erebor’s slopes, listening to Balin and his father singing old drinking songs and laughing. He could feel himself drifting…

A cold nose snuffling against his neck startled him awake. Thorin blinked blearily, staring up at the white stag in confusion. How long had he been asleep? He looked up to find that the sun had advanced a bit in the sky. An hour or two, then.

The deer nibbled on his sleeve and Thorin batted it away gently. “Stop that, you strange creature.”

Moving slowly so as not to startle it, Thorin reached out and scratched it under the chin. The stag huffed happily, tilting its head to give Thorin better access to its neck. Thorin wondered how much Thranduil controlled the beast. Was it merely a puppet? Surely it had some mind of its own, else it would not be quite so animalistic. Thranduil was odd most of the time, but it seemed unlikely that he had some hidden desire to have Thorin scratch him under the chin.

Soon, the Elvenking himself emerged from the tangle of fallen trees and woodland rubbish. He looked content, or as content as he ever appeared to be. 

“Did your conversation with the plants go well?”

“It did,” Thranduil said, uncaring of Thorin’s sarcasm. He strode over to the horse and began digging through its saddlebags.

“I hope you aren’t planning to try and clear the land.” Thorin stood and stretched until his back popped. “It would be impossible to get a team of horses through your mess of a forest. Unless your elk can drag whole trees. Oh! Does your magic deer ever become jealous of the giant elk?”

The best part about that particular line of questioning, Thorin mused as he patted the stag’s side, was that it served the dual purpose of assuaging his curiosity and irritating Thranduil.

“Be quiet and hold these,” Thranduil said, tossing a small bundle at Thorin.

“Are we not returning to the palace?”

“No,” Thranduil said, pulling a blanket out of the saddlebags. “We are having lunch here.”

“A picnic. How sweet.”

“If I dine in my palace, the envoy from Lothlorien will no doubt seek me out, and I would prefer peace and quiet,” Thranduil said. He paused and gave Thorin a significant look. “So perhaps you should not speak.”

“Hah! So the mighty Thranduil is hiding in the forest from another elf lord’s minion.”

“One day, you will be a king,” Thranduil said, shaking out a light green blanket, “assuming you do not get your foolish head caved in before that. When you take the throne, you’ll see firsthand that the greatest daily threat you will face is the art of diplomacy.”

Thorin couldn’t help but laugh, as he’d often heard his father and grandfather express similar sentiments. Balin never had, but then, diplomacy came as naturally to Balin as flight did to birds. Thorin wasn’t so lucky; while he was not as fidgety as Frerin was during long meetings, he often found his thoughts drifting towards all the things he would rather be doing. He settled down on one edge of the blanket and asked, “What did Lothlorien do to warrant such a grudge?”

“It is old, tired history that I would rather be rid of,” Thranduil said kneeling across from Thorin.

“What a cryptic way of not answering my question.”

“Thank you.” Thranduil opened the bundles, revealing cheese, several apples, and a strange, yellow triangle of thick bread that was wrapped in leaves. 

Thorin immediately reached for an apple. Whatever else could be said of Mirkwood (haunted, terrifying, filthy with elves), the trees bore delicious apples. Around a mouthful of fruit, he asked, “So are you going to try and clear the land?”

“No,” Thranduil responded, breaking off a small piece of the bread and nibbling the edge of it. “Even if I could, I would choose not to. Fallen trees can be home to all manner of creatures, and their eventual decay will bring new growth and life to the forest.”

A thought occurred to Thorin suddenly, and he let out a snort that was somewhere between derisive and self-deprecating.

“Do you disapprove of foxes having shelter?” Thranduil asked, raising an eyebrow.

“No, no, I just had a thought.” Thorin chewed another bite of apple contemplatively before saying, “It’s strange, that elves have such an affinity for nature. Everything in it is always dying and being broken down to make new life, and you elves are ageless and unchanging.”

Thranduil tilted his head, his expression thoughtful. “Whereas the dwarves-

“Stone. Gems. Crafts. Words. Things that will outlive us and might well exist forever, in the right circumstances.”

Thranduil smiled wryly. “I have long thought that the forces that shaped our races and our world had very little understanding of irony.”

“Or aesthetics, else why would you be so freakishly tall?”

Thranduil reached out and stroked a finger along Thorin’s jawline. The touch made Thorin’s blood go hot, as touches just like it had served a precursor to desperate, helpless lust many times before. “You seem not to mind my height.”

Thorin blushed and then was furious at himself for blushing. He murmured some vague denial and set about demolishing the rest of his apple rather than look at Thranduil. When the apple was gone and Thorin needed another topic of conversation, he gestured at the bread Thranduil was holding.

“What is that?”

“Lembas.” Thranduil broke a small piece off and handed it to Thorin. “It was baked last winter and I am trying to clear out the old stores to make room for the new.”

Thorin sniffed at it curiously. The smell reminded him of crackers. “So it is like _cram_?”

“Considerably more appealing, I’m told.”

Thorin snorted and popped the lembas into his mouth, ready to scornfully declare it nothing special. His eyes widened. The lembas was as warm and soft as bread fresh from the oven, and it tasted freshly buttered. A warm, contented feeling spread through him as he swallowed, and he reached for another piece.

“I take it the lembas receives your seal of approval?” Thranduil said with a small smile.

“Not terrible,” Thorin allowed, breaking off a considerably larger chunk.

As they ate, Thorin asked a few more questions about the storm damage and the forest. Apparently, Thranduil was actually thankful for a few powerful storms each year, since it helped to disrupt the spider webs and clear out some of the nests. There was no steady population of spiders, as Thorin has assumed, but instead a constant flow in and out of the forest from some unknown source. Thorin made a mental note to warn his people about the potential for meeting spiders while traversing the forest’s boundaries. The caravans were fragile enough without giant arachnids added to the mix.

When the food was gone and the conversation turned to quiet, Thorin stretched his arms over his head lazily and said, “You cannot avoid your palace forever, you know.”

“Oh, I think I can avoid it just a little while longer,” Thranduil said, smirking and moving forward with predatory intent. 

Thorin was pushed backwards and found himself staring up at the sky as Thranduil kissed his throat. It was hard to be tense when the sun was so warm and his stomach was full of good food. It was easier, far easier, to relax and bare his throat. Surrounded by sunlight and birdsong, Thorin could forget that Thranduil was an enemy.

Thranduil’s hand slid up into Thorin’s shirt, his fingers tangling in the dark hair of his chest. There was a burst of sensation as his fingers scratched across a nipple, and Thorin gasped and arched his back. Not too much, not enough to be completely obvious, but enough to give Thranduil more room to touch him and surround him.

“I want you,” Thranduil murmured against Thorin’s chest, his eyes flickering up to meet Thorin’s own.

 _He is asking permission_ , Thorin realized, licking his suddenly dry lips. He could say no, could end this now and send them both back to the palace. But…but there was a low heat in his belly, like embers waiting to be stoked, and Thranduil was a warm weight against his legs. It would not be wrong to have this, not when he was a prisoner, not when he had given his word. It would not be wrong.

Thorin nodded sharply, just once.

Thranduil’s hands moved down his chest, fingers skimming along his abdomen and into his navel before coming to settle on his belt. He leaned over Thorin, his hair surrounding them both like a curtain. “Are you certai-”

“Get on with it before I grow bored.”

Dwarvish buckles and knots were often complex by design, but Thranduil seemed to have no trouble with them. Thorin was tempted to make a sarcastic comment, but Thranduil’s thumb was resting directly above his groin, tracing small circles, and Thorin found himself utterly distracted. He did not breathe out until Thranduil had the belt undone and was sliding it down his hips.

“I can—here.” Thorin sat up halfway, toeing his boots off and reaching for the buttons to his shirt. Now that this was happening for certain, he found he had no patience for anything slow and methodical.

Thranduil sat back on his heels, his hands resting on Thorin’s knees. It wasn’t until Thorin tugged his undershirt over his head that he realized that Thranduil was not undressing, simply watching Thorin with a dizzying intensity. There was a strange power in that, one that Thorin had become increasingly aware of as his captivity progressed. Thranduil was ancient and unknowable and dangerous, but every now and then, he could be made to stop and stare just like any mere mortal.

“Take your clothes off as well,” Thorin said, surprised by the growl in his voice. “I won’t be the only one lying naked out here.”

Thranduil’s smile was small but real, and he began unfastening the buttons of his robe with businesslike speed. With the daring of someone who was half-frightened and half-giddy, Thorin reached forward and helped push the robe off Thranduil’s shoulders. It surrounded the Elvenking like a silvery puddle, and Thorin crushed the fabric with his knees as he shuffled forward. Beneath the robe, Thranduil was wearing a cream-colored silk tunic, and Thorin tugged that upwards as well.

Undressing Thranduil was new and strange, and it made something twist in Thorin’s gut. 

Thranduil slipped out of his trousers with ease, never losing his otherworldly grace, and then he and Thorin were staring at each other, both of them bare and half-hard. Thorin stared at Thranduil’s cock, watching it harden a little more under his gaze. 

“All right,” Thorin murmured, lying back across the blanket and letting his knees part.

Thranduil kissed the inside of his thigh. “Have you done this before?”

Thorin shook his head. “Not this, no.”

“It should not hurt,” Thranduil said, and suddenly there was a finger against Thorin’s entrance, warm and slick with oil. When had Thranduil gotten out the oil? Perhaps Thorin’s nerves were worse than he would admit. “If it does, tell me.”

And then Thranduil’s mouth was on his prick, hot and soft as he swallowed around him. Thorin’s back arched and he hissed through his teeth. The Elvenking had only done this once before, pinning Thorin to the dining room table to make some kind of mad point. It was no less effective now, Thranduil’s tongue rendering Thorin speechless as it curled around the head of his cock. He let his legs spread wider, exposing himself completely.

There was a twinge of friction from deep within him and Thorin realized Thranduil was sliding his finger inside. The slick drag of it was strange and uncomfortable, but not quite painful. As Thranduil began edging it forward and back, Thorin let out a breath he had not even realized he was holding. 

Thranduil’s hair tickled the skin of Thorin’s legs, the long blonde strands catching slightly on the dark hair of Thorin’s legs every time the Elvenking moved. And the Elvenking was moving constantly, his fingers and tongue a relentless rhythm that had Thorin shaking. His hips bucked, pushing himself further down against Thranduil’s finger, and the friction of it was no longer uncomfortable. Thranduil’s free hand wrapped around his hips, holding him down.

Thorin fisted his hands in the fabric of the blanket as Thranduil’s moved faster, the movement inside of him sending lazy sparks up his spine. His voice breathier than he’d have liked, Thorin asked, “Deflowered many virgins in meadows, have you?”

Thranduil actually _laughed_ around his cock, making Thorin jump. He nearly jumped again when a second finger joined the first inside of him, making his arse feel uncomfortably full. 

“After the last week, I would say you’re hardly a virgin,” Thranduil said, leaning against Thorin’s thigh and blowing a cool stream of air against the head of his cock. It made Thorin clench down, and Thranduil twisted his fingers.

Thorin groaned loudly enough that it was embarrassing. Thranduil’s fingers felt huge inside of him, the sensation skittering on the edge of pain, but Thorin had never been one to flinch in the face of pain. And his cock was so hard that he could feel his pulse in it; that seemed like as good a reason as any to growl out, “I told you to get on with it, I’m not some maiden you have to-”

Thranduil angled his fingers sharply and thrust up, jabbing at _something_ inside of him that made Thorin go breathless. He dug his heels into the earth, trying to push Thranduil’s fingers further inside of him. 

“Again,” he gasped, “do that again.”

“I will,” Thranduil breathed. His huge blue eyes were nearly black and his cheeks were redder than Thorin had ever seen them. He had done that, he had made the Elvenking’s blood race, and Thorin held onto that thought even as Thranduil curled his fingers inside of him.

He actually groaned as the Elvenking withdrew his fingers, leaving him achingly aware of the warm, slick oil smeared around his hole. Thranduil leaned over him, pulling Thorin’s hips up. “Relax for me, dear one, relax.”

“Don’t ‘dear one’ me, you-” And then Thorin was moaning, wordless, as Thranduil slid into him slowly but steadily. Thorin gripped Thranduil’s shoulders so tightly that the skin around his fingers was completely white. Oh, _oh_ , he was so full. It was too much, too much, he wanted it to stop, he wanted more, he _wanted_.

Above him, Thranduil was breathing hard, his chest rising and falling with shaky need. His hips were pressed flush against Thorin’s own. “Are you…should I…”

“Just-” Thorin shifted, trying to adjust to the fullness of someone inside him. Every movement Thranduil made felt as if it was amplified inside of him, like a harp string plucked and vibrating. “Move, move now, I want it.”

That was all the permission Thranduil needed, surging back and then into Thorin with a moan that sounded almost pained. The feeling of it, full and hot and good, set starbursts off behind Thorin’s eyes. He dug his heels into Thranduil’s back, urging him on.

“You are beautiful, beautiful like this,” Thranduil panted against Thorin’s throat. His breath was as hot as the air from a forge. Thorin didn’t mind; he would have gladly let himself combust in that moment.

The blanket bunched up beneath Thorin’s back as they moved and he knew he was going to have a fabric burn after this was over. He didn’t care, would gladly have let himself be covered head-to-toe in bruises if it meant he got to keep the molten pleasure inside of him.

Thranduil struck that spot inside of him again and again, locating it entirely based on the way it made Thorin gasp. He closed his eyes, overwhelmed, and hung on for dear life. As his muscles tensed all over, his hips stuttered in their rhythm and his breath came fast and ragged. When he came, it was like an electric current was coursing through him. Thorin realized he was speaking, gasping out half-words of Khuzdul as he shook from the aftershocks of his orgasm.

Above him, Thranduil was staring with a rapt, fascinated expression. His skin was damp, little points of moisture beading on his collarbones, and Thorin realized he had never seen the Elvenking sweat before.

When Thranduil came, he was wordless.

In the silence that followed, Thorin slowly became aware of their surroundings once more. They were half-off the blanket. There were leaves in Thorin’s hair. Thranduil’s legs were tangled in his own robe. He could not quite bring himself to care and murmured, “Not the worst way to avoid your responsibilities.”

Thranduil breathed out a laugh and laid his head against Thorin’s chest.


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! Sorry about the long delay between chapters; this summer has been pretty crappy for me mental health-wise and so I haven't gotten much writing done. I'm on the upswing though (fingers crossed), so have some Middle Earth politics.
> 
> As always, you can contact me at my Tumblr: http://shinynewwriting.tumblr.com/

It took another two days before Thorin actually saw the oft-mentioned envoy from Lothlórien, and it was purely by accident. In retrospect, he realized Thranduil had very deliberately been keeping the two of them separated.

Thorin had taken to exploring the palace, curious about its nooks and crannies. Elves were not cave-dwellers by nature, and it was fascinating to see how different their designs were compared to Erebor’s familiar halls. Thranduil’s palace meandered, following what had to have been the natural path of the caves. Walkways and rooms wove around each other like cross-currents in a stream. At first, Thorin had assumed that the elves simply lacked the knowledge to bend the caves to their design the way dwarves did. But the more he explored, the more he realized that Thranduil had deliberately allowed his palace to mimic the flow of the underground rivers that had created the caverns. It was utterly daft, a shining example of form over function, but Thorin had to admit that it was beautiful.

He was following one such meandering hallway when it brought him to a balcony he had never visited before. A quick glance around showed nothing of interest, and Thorin nearly turned to leave when he heard a familiar voice from the courtyard.

“-hardly her concern, as I have mentioned several times previously.”

Thorin so rarely got the opportunity to spy on anyone, and it seemed a shame to let this chance pass by. Doing his breath to step softly and breathe silently, he crept toward the balcony railing. In the courtyard below, Thranduil was in a heated conversation with an unfamiliar elf.

“Must something be her concern before the Lady is allowed to be concerned by it?” The strange elf was a bit shorter than Thranduil, with a spill of wavy blonde hair running down her back. Even from a distance, Thorin could see that her gown was made of rich material and intricately detailed stitching, far beyond what the servants and guards of Thranduil’s palace wore. _This must be Lothlórien’s envoy,_ Thorin thought, crouching down on his heels to make himself smaller.

“She is welcome to be concerned,” Thranduil said, his voice icy and his glare withering. It was the sort of disdainful dislike that Thorin was very familiar with. “What is not welcome are her continued harassments after I have made it clear that Lothlórien and Galadriel are not welcome here.”

“I would hardly call two ambassadors in five years ‘harassment’,” the envoy said, unmoved by the almost physical wave of distaste radiating from Thranduil. “You have _no contact_ with the rest of our race, your Highness. Word reached us of Smaug’s attack months before we had any news of whether your entire kingdom had been eaten or not.”

“And again, why should it concern Lothlórien if Greenwood is burnt alive? We have no trade with your kingdom, no contact, and that is how we prefer it.”

The envoy sighed, her frustration clear even through her veneer of elvish calm. Thorin found himself empathizing with her, if only because he knew how painfully difficult it was to reason with Thranduil if he did not care to hear what was being said. The envoy gestured to the forest beyond the walls of the courtyard. “Your lands are sick, King Thranduil. How long has your forest been Mirkwood rather than Greenwood? Lady Galadriel offers her help, nothing more. Your fears are unfounded.”

Thranduil’s gaze grew even icier, if possible. Sarcasm made his deep voice jagged and biting when he responded, “Indeed, what cause would I have to fear, knowing that the pulse and life of my lands were held in the palm of Galadriel’s hands? It would be simpler by far to shrug off the weight of my title and put my crown upon her head, you are right.”

“The Lady of the Woods does not come to you as a conqueror-”

“The Lady of the Woods came to these shores as a conqueror!” Thranduil snapped. “While her kin chased fire and revenge, she was intent on carving a kingdom of her own. Can she not be content with it? Must she scrabble for mine as well?”

“Arda is not as it was when Galadriel came to this land,” the envoy replied, her tone beseeching. “The world is changed. I am a thousand years younger than you and even I can feel it, your Highness. Our people dwindle with each passing year as the kingdoms of men and dwarves rise. If the last of the elf lords do not band together, then we will wither alone.”

“Galadriel and Elrond may wither,” Thranduil said, his voice and posture so brittle that he seemed to be on the edge of shattering. “My kingdom, my people, we will endure as we always have.”

“No one can endure when they are utterly alone.” The envoy did not speak like someone who was arguing. Indeed, she seemed sympathetic, understanding. A fine diplomatic tactic, but from what Thorin knew of Thranduil, it would make him angrier rather than calming him. “Erebor is smashed and scattered to the winds. The men of Dale were burnt and brought low. You have no trade and no allies left in the entire region. All that we offer is-”

“Thorin!”

Thranduil’s shout startled Thorin so badly that he yelped. He stayed crouched and frozen, looking wide-eyed down at the elves.

“I know you are up there, dwarf,” Thranduil hissed, glaring at Thorin’s hiding place. “You breathe so loudly the entire forest probably knows where you are.”

Thorin winced. So much for spycraft. He stood warily. “Just passing by.”

The envoy looked at him, fascination clear in her features. Dwarves were not a common sight in elven kingdoms. “Join us, eavesdropper.”

Thranduil’s jaw clenched so hard that his teeth had to be close to cracking. “No.”

Well, that decided it, then. Thorin swung over the railing of the balcony, dangling for a moment while he judged the drop. Then he let go, landing in the courtyard before with a loud _thump_. As he approached, he saw that a muscle was twitching in Thranduil’s jaw. _Good._

The envoy nodded at him in greeting. “Hello there. I am Amairë, of Lothlórien. I was unaware that King Thranduil had offered any dwarves sanctuary.”

“He hasn’t,” Thorin said, nodding in return. “I am Thorin, of the line of Durin.”

He heard Thranduil sigh with the resigned frustration of someone who had just seen the inevitable happen. Amairë’s eyes widened. “Thorin, prince of Erebor.”

“Such as it is, yes.”

She glanced between them, no doubt taking note of the tension in the air. “Are you not a guest of the king?”

“A prisoner,” Thorin responded, taking note of how Thranduil was doing his best imitation of a particularly disdainful statue. “The caravan I was leading came a little too close to the borders of the forest, and so I’ve been forcefully invited to stay for the month.”

Amairë was quick to hide it, but Thorin saw the flash of frustration and disappointment that crossed her face. When she turned to Thranduil again, she had retreated behind a polite diplomatic mask. “I see. If you will excuse me, King Thranduil, I’ve taken enough of your time this evening.”

With that, she turned on her heel and was gone a bit quicker than was polite. Thorin and Thranduil both stared after her.

“Had I known that introducing the two of you would make her leave me be, I would have done it days ago,” Thranduil said.

Thorin looked up at him, considering. “Is what she said true?”

“About Galadriel’s trustworthiness? No, not in the least.”

“Not that.” Thorin’s policy of assuming all elves were untrustworthy had yet to steer him wrong. “About your kingdom being isolated. Who exactly are you trading with now?”

Thranduil stiffened, and Thorin realized that the envoy had been correct. With Erebor abandoned and Dale burnt to ashes, Mirkwood was like an island in a vast sea of unclaimed land. Thorin tried to picture the surrounding regions. To the far east, there was the Iron Hills, but he knew for a fact that his kin were not even in contact with Thranduil. To the north, there were only the abandoned dwarven settlements in the Grey Mountains. With Khazad-dûm a ruin and Thranduil refusing contact with Lothlórien, the only remaining power on the eastern side of the Misty Mountains was Rohan and Gondor, hundreds of miles to the south.

“It is none of your concern either, dwarf,” Thranduil said, turning as if to leave.

Thorin had not wasted much of his time wondering what would become of Mirkwood after Erebor’s fall. He’d been far too preoccupied trying to survive the last five years. But now the thought was in his head and he could not shake it loose. “The villages of Men, they’re lucky to have thirty people in them. That little shanty town on the lake won’t be nearly enough to-”

Thranduil darted forward before Thorin could even finish his sentence. Thorin flinched backwards, but Thranduil followed, maneuvering them until Thorin’s shoulders were pressed against the courtyard wall.

“It is none of your concern,” Thranduil repeated, his face mere inches from Thorin’s, “and I would advise you to remember who is a king and who is a penniless prisoner here.”

And then he was gone as well, striding out of the courtyard in what was clearly a towering fury. Thorin stayed pressed against the wall, trying to understand why a question about trade had sparked Thranduil’s temper in a way that none of his deliberate antagonizing ever had.


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey all! I am excited to announce that, after nearly three years, I think I'm finally entering the home stretch on this story! I am estimating about two to three chapters are left, so stick with me for just a bit longer.

The envoy left the next morning, taking her retinue with her. Thorin had assumed that would put Thranduil in a better mood, but he did not see the Elvenking for the next day and a half. There were no meals with him, no meetings, no contact at all. Thorin was still allowed out of his cell, but he was never summoned. He was being ignored.

The realization irritated him more than he liked to admit. It was not that he wanted Thranduil’s attention, necessarily. But it was another power play on Thranduil’s part, showing Thorin that he could be shuffled off to the side without a thought. It rankled, but there was little Thorin could do. If Thranduil did not want to be found, then being insistent would only make him more unpleasant than he already was.

Instead, Thorin used his extra time to explore more of the palace. The servants and guards no longer gawked at him quite so obviously, and now that his beard was more than stubble, Thorin no longer felt the need to hide in the shadows every time someone noticed him. He bypassed the dungeons and headed further downwards, into an absolutely cavernous wine cellar. The sight of _so much_ wine made Thorin laugh, and he wondered if Thranduil would notice if he smuggled a bottle back to his room. Logically, it would be impossible for him to know one bottle was missing, but Thranduil had access to arcane magics. Thorin wouldn’t put it past him to use that power to keep an eye on the wine cellar. 

In the end, Thorin opted to leave the wine cellar empty-handed. It was only the seventeenth day of his imprisonment; he could always steal the wine later if things became dire. 

Of course, not drinking himself into oblivion left him with nothing to do, and so Thorin wandered back into the training yard with vague intentions of shooting a target until he felt better. That plan was quickly derailed when he discovered Thranduil in the courtyard, surrounded by training dummies and clutching two long, slender swords.

Thorin leaned against the doorway, more than a little fascinated. He had never seen Thranduil fight, and it was hard to even imagine such a thing. Thranduil was always so tightly controlled, untouched and untouchable. The filth and panic of battle were so anathema to Thranduil that just thinking about the Elvenking in the midst of it all was strange and slightly uncomfortable.

His musings were cut short when Thranduil began to move, bringing both swords up into a defensive position. Dual-wielding was not popular amongst the dwarves, and so Thorin was genuinely curious to study how it worked. But once Thranduil fell into a rhythm, Thorin found it hard to think at all.

Thranduil moved like the wind and the water, each motion smooth effortless, and powerful. He was never still, not even for a second, attacking each dummy like a whirlwind of blades and armor. At first it seemed like madness to fight without some kind of shield, but watching Thranduil made it clear that he was light and fast enough that no sword could touch him. He was beautiful, and very deadly. Thorin was abruptly grateful that he had never gone up against Thranduil on the battlefield, because he would need a few more decades of practice before he would even stand a chance.

Thranduil’s one-sided sparring ended as abruptly as it had begun, with one swing of his sword cutting the head off the training dummy in front of him. The little straw-filled bit of leather bounced as it hit the ground and rolled to Thorin’s feet. Considering that the swords were dulled for training, the force behind Thranduil’s swing must have been tremendous.

The blood was hot in Thorin’s veins, and he was only a bit ashamed of it. He looked up to see Thranduil watching him. “I think you’ve won.”

Thranduil’s lips quirked, just slightly. “Hello, Thorin.”

“So, you avoid me for a day and a half,” Thorin said, stepping forward into the training yard, “and then, by sheer coincidence, I find you practicing in my courtyard.”

“ _Your_ courtyard?” Thranduil asked, raising an eyebrow.

“My courtyard,” Thorin confirmed. As he drew closer to Thranduil, he could see that although the Elvenking was not sweating, a few small hairs were out of place, slightly tangled in the silver threads of his robe. Feeling daring, Thorin reached up to brush them away. “Say what you will about the stubbornness of dwarves, but we are capable of being direct, when we need to be. Unlike you.”

Thranduil grabbed hold of his wrist, and while his grip was firm, it was not harsh. “I owe you neither my time nor my attention. You are a prisoner-”

“Yes, yes,” Thorin said, waving with his free hand as if Thranduil’s words were irritating flies he could swat away. He was quite aware of what he was. “And since I am a prisoner, and the elven idea of hospitality is rather unique, perhaps we could do something besides stand in my courtyard and argue?”

Seeing Thranduil with a blade in his hand was affecting him rather strongly, it turned out.

Thranduil tilted his head, birdlike, and then let a slow smile creep across his face. He let his thumb rub against the pulse point of Thorin’s wrist and said, “If you insist.”  
***  
The nightmares that woke Thorin were painfully familiar, enough so that it only took a few moments of gasping and looking around wildly to ascertain that he was not in Erebor and was not on fire. He kicked the blankets off of him regardless. He could see sweat gleaming on his skin under the moonlight that flooded in through the windows.

Thranduil’s bedroom was at least brightly lit.

Already wincing, he turned to look at Thranduil. The elf was awake and staring right at him, his eyes eerily reflective. After a moment, he said, “It was only a nightmare, Thorin. You are safe.”

“I know,” Thorin responded, pushing himself off the bed. He did not want to be so close to Thranduil when he could feel tears drying on his face and taste the foul bile of his own fear in the back of his throat. Despite the fact that he had been bare and writhing under Thranduil only a few hours ago, the aftermath of his nightmare still felt more naked and vulnerable.

He walked to the balcony, hoping the night air would calm him and dry the sweat on his skin. The doors swung open soundlessly, revealing the vast, dark expanse of Mirkwood. From above, it looked very peaceful, moonlight dancing on the tree tops. But any peace Thorin might have found in the view was quickly cut short by the distant, familiar shape of Erebor. From far away, it was impossible to see that anything had changed. In the quiet darkness of night, it was easy to pretend that the mountain was full of slumbering dwarves rather than one huge and terrible monster.

“After Smaug took the mountain, fires burned across the slopes for days,” Thranduil said from behind him. Thorin turned to see the Elvenking striding across the room to join him on the balcony, his skin as pale as the moonlight. It was distracting enough that he could almost forget about the dark slopes of Erebor in the corner of his eye. “There was nothing but bare rock for nearly a year. But now the new growth has made the mountain green again.”

Thorin raised an eyebrow. “If that is some Elvish way of offering comfort, it’s hardly effective.”

“Merely an observation,” Thranduil said with a small smile. He leaned against the stone railing of the balcony, unbothered by the cold stone against his skin. His expression went blank again as he looked at the mountain. “The Men on the lake bring gifts every year to the gates of Erebor, as if it will make the dragon spare them.”

“Perhaps they can start sacrificing their virgins, next,” Thorin growled. 

“Nothing would shock me,” Thranduil said, not looking away from the mountain. “They are desperate and terrified.”

Thorin stared at him, trying to gauge if his question would spark Thranduil’s temper. _Nothing ventured, nothing gained._ “Why not take them in? They are not dwarves, you have no quarrel with them, and Mahal knows men fall in love with everything elves do.” 

Thranduil sighed, and for a moment Thorin worried that he had indeed angered the elf. But instead of violence, Thranduil reached out to cup Thorin’s cheek in one hand, the touch gentle and…sweet, for lack of a better term. 

“You are young enough to believe you can save everyone if only you try hard enough,” Thranduil said, his fingers stroking across the lines of Thorin’s jaw. “And I am old enough to know that is never the case.”

“So instead you save no one at all?”

“Do you know what heroism leads to, Thorin?” Thranduil asked, his voice actually wavering. “Do you know what lies behind every song and legend? Death and rot and ruin, a graveyard full of thousands of bodies. Battle is not glorious. There is no honor in war. There is only the helpless knowledge that your people are dying and your loved ones are already dead, and it is _your fault_.”

It was the most earnest Thranduil had ever been, and the sadness in his eyes was breathtaking. Thorin reached up to cup his hand, warm against his cheek. He had never asked where Legolas’ mother was, or what had happened to Thranduil’s father, but now he suspected he had the answer to both.

“The men of the lake are not bringing you war,” Thorin said. After a moment of hesitation, he added, “My people cannot bring you a war any longer, either.”

“But war will come nonetheless.” Thranduil’s voice was distant and he was no long looking at Thorin. He stared up at the stars, as ageless and unchanging as he was. “Where ever the races of Arda mix, war comes. The only safety is behind your own walls.”

“And if a dragon smashes through your walls?” Thorin asked.

Thranduil looked down at him again, seemingly coming back to himself. “Your people will heal, Thorin. They will outlast your grandfather. Your father is wise. You have at least the potential for the same wisdom.”

“Such flattery.”

“The dwarves of Erebor will find safety and prosperity somewhere far from here,” Thranduil said, turning away from the mountain. “In a few decades, this place will only be a memory to you.”

Thorin shook his head. “Erebor was my home. Erebor will always be my home.” The potential for an argument was there, and some part of Thorin craved it. But the moment was quiet, peaceful as they were bared to each other in more ways than one, and Thorin did not want to shatter that peace. “Just as this dirty, spider-infested forest will always be your home.”

Thranduil smiled, rare and real, and then took Thorin’s hand. “Come back to bed, dwarf. The dawn won’t come for a few more hours.”


End file.
